Visitors from the Land of Voices
by The Bound Fenrir
Summary: Naruto, Sasuke, and Neji must act as escorts for a group of VIPs from the Village Hidden in the Music The Vocaloids Miku, Kaito, and the Kagamine twins as they travel around the Hidden Leaf Village. My first story SakuXMiku, NaruXRin, KaitoXIceCream
1. Prologue

**Visitors from the Land of Voices!**

_**A Naruto/Vocaloid fanfiction**_

Naruto opened the door to the Hokage's room and, as he did every time he came in, said to himself "Someday, I'll own this room!" He stepped in and asked, "So, what awesome mission do you have for me this time, Grandma Tsunade?"

"Well, if you'd shown up on time, you might know, Naruto." Neji pointed out from where he was standing in the room. "How you made it to Genin at all is beyond me." Naruto looked around the room and saw that Sasuke was here as well.

"Hello, Loser." Sasuke grumbled, "I suppose your going to be our partner. Hmph." Naruto was just as happy to see Sasuke as Sasuke was to see him. Grandma Tsunade stood up behind her table.

"How nice of you to join us, Naruto. Now, if you three are through, may I continue?" Naruto noticed Tsunade had that tic on her head that usually meant she was about to show off her thousand-mile punch.

"Of course, Lady Tsunade." Neji said, "Don't mind their prattle."

"Thank you, Neji." Tsunade quipped, "I feel so honored." With that she switched moods and became serious "You three are performing a very important mission for the whole of the Land of Fire. There has recently been a discovery of White Fang mineral deposits on the border between the Land of Fire and the Land of Voices. The leading village in the Land of Voices is the Village Hidden in the Music. They have always been peaceable allies, but White Fang is an incredibly rare and valuable mineral. We need to be very careful to make their emissaries as comfortable as possible during their visit. You three will be their guides."

"Are a couple of fighters and the village idiot really the best choices for a negotiation mission?" Neji asked, "I would think Shikamaru and Sakura would be better choices." Before Naruto could say anything about not being an idiot, Tsunade answered Neji.

"Yes, they would." Tsunade walked over to the map and pointed at the Village Hidden in the Mist, "But they're currently on a particularly unstable negotiation in the Village Hidden in the Mist, and it would very, very bad if they were pulled out right now. You're the best options we have at the given time. Shizune, if you could brief them on the emissaries." Tsunade sat back down at her desk as Shizune picked up several pictures and began talking.

"The emissaries from the Village Hidden in the Music are a team of a jounin, a chunin, and two genin. Given that they've sent genin instead of a team of jounin has given us confidence that they are being just as peaceable about this as we are. Their names are: Kaito Shion, the jounin, Miku Hatsune, the chunin, Kagamine Rin and Lin, twin genin." Shizune pointed to each of the pictures as she spoke, "Rin is the girl, and the 'elder' of the twins. As you can see, ninjas from the Hidden Music Village don't wear headbands, but instead wear these headsets. Kaito and Miku are both well-known singers in the Land of Voices, so they may be expecting the celebrity treatment. While we don't know that for sure, if they're expecting it, give it to them. We want them to feel at home. Your jobs will be to help them find their way around the village, take them to all the tourist spots, and in general do anything they need you to do."

"We are expecting you to be on your best behavior," Tsunade pointed out, looking only at Naruto, "So no funny business, you here me Naruto!"

"Yeah, yeah, I hear you, Grandma Tsunade." Naruto complained, "But why are you point at me, specitically?"

"Because, Naruto," Neji pointed out, "You are the one who is likely to do something weird like that." Naruto noticed Sasuke murmured something along the lines of "Stupid Loser".

"Hey! Why I ought to…" Naruto began, but Tsunade cut him off.

"What you ought to do is get serious and get down to the village gate! The emissaries are due to arrive some time this afternoon, and you have just enough time to get down there and eat a light lunch before they arrive." Tsunade pointed out her window in the direction of the main gate. "Get moving."


	2. Chapter 1

Naruto finished up his insta-ramen, and looked at the crowd, searching for one of the four ninjas from the Village in the Music. He could see Sasuke eating his dumplings over in one of the trees just outside the gate, and Neji putting his chopsticks up over by a food stand near the inside of the gate. Then someone tapped Naruto on his shoulder.

"Naruto, good to see you!" Jeriah said as he sat down beside Naruto.

"Pervy Sage!" Naruto smiled, "Good to see you too! But I'm on a mission right now, so I can't really talk." Naruto was sad he couldn't sit and talk with Pervy Sage, but Grandma Tsunade had made it clear she would remove his head if he messed this mission up, and he liked his head where it was.

"What mission is that? It looks to me like your just eating lunch by the gate." Jeriah looked around as he said this, obviously watching the crowd himself.

"Me, Sasuke, and Neji are going to be the guides for the emissaries from the Hidden Music Village!" At this, Jeriah's eyes bulged out.

"REALLY! You're the ones who get to meet the gorgeous Miku Hatsune! You are the luckiest ninja I have ever met, Naruto. Can I please hang out with you while you escort her? Come on, Naruto! I'll behave, honest! I'll even help; I'll be your personal chauffeur! Come on!" Jeriah was practically jumping up and down.

"No, keeping people like you away from them is part of our job, isn't that right Naruto?" Neji said pointedly, having walked over to them during Jeriah's overly energetic request.

"Sorry, Pervy Sage, but Neji's actually kinda right. Grandma Tsunade would have our heads if we let you interrupt their trip." Naruto apologized. Jeriah seemed to deflate before Naruto's eyes.

"pleeeeasssssse. . . naaaarutooo. . .i proooomiiiiissse. . ." Jeriah was turning into a pile of goop at Naruto's feet. It was sad. There were people in the crowd weeping over it. Sasuke actually said something NICE, before he started slitting his wrists with a kunai. Back to the story:

"Stay away from them, or we will be required to use force." Neji stated to a slightly recovered Jeriah. "Consider this your first and only warning." He turned to go back to watching the crowd, then added, "And remember; I'll see you coming."

Jeriah, recovered enough to stand now, walked off into the crowd making sniffling noises. As he disappeared into the masses, Sasuke tapped on Neji's shoulder and made a discreet pointing gesture in the direction of the road outside the gate. Still a fair distance down it Naruto could see a pair of long, teal ponytails and a pair of people with yellow clothes and blonde hair. They were still to far away to tell anything else about them, but the teal ponytails were very distinct, and made it obvious that it was the Hidden Music Village ninjas.

"We got rid of him just in time." Neji noted as he dusted the Jeriah goop off his clothes. "Naruto, let me do the talking, ok?" He stepped over to the inside of the gate, over to the left side so that he would easily be picked out from the crowds walking in and out. As they got closer, Naruto could make out the fourth one, Kaito, walking beside Miku. They appeared to be talking, but Naruto couldn't hear what about. When they got to the gate Neji waved them over.

"Welcome to the Village Hidden in the Leaves, My name is Neji Hyuga, and these are my compatriots Sasuke Uchiha," As he said this he gestured towards Sasuke, then Naruto, "and Naruto Uzumaki. We will be your guides while you stay in the village."

"Hello, Neji. I'm Kaito Shion, and this is my squad; Miku Hatsune," the blue one, Kaito, said and the teal-haired girl nodded her head with a smile, "Rin Kagamine," the girl twin nodded her head and smiled cutely, "and her twin brother Lin." The remaining twin smiled and nodded his head politely. "It is a pleasure to meet you." He smiled himself and Naruto was reminded of a TV commercial for toothpaste he'd never seen.

"I hope we don't inconvenience you too much, I'd hate to be trouble." Lin blushed as he stood there. His sister put her arm around his shoulders and said:

"Relax; if they want to roll out the red carpet, let them roll out the red carpet." She leaned back and winked at Kaito, who just rolled his eyes.

"I told you, it's not like that. Besides, this is far from the red carpet. This is just being pleasant hosts, same as we'd do for them back home." Kaito pointed out. Miku grinned at this.

"Yeah, besides. You get used to it. It actually gets on your nerves after a while. 'Oh, can I help you with that?' or 'No, let me get that for you.' Or even 'I couldn't possibly sit by and make you do that!' it's as if they're worried you'll break." Naruto was to busy listening to Miku to notice that with each quote Rin cringed as if being hit with a blow. Kaito rolled his eyes again and muttered something about 'ice-cream', whatever that was. Neji stepped in politely attempting to derail the conversation.

"May we escort you to the rooms you will be using while you visit?" Kaito jumped in, relieved.

"We would appreciate that, thank you." He smiled, putting a hand on each of the girls' shoulders. Naruto could have sworn he saw Kaito's hands squeeze suddenly and each of the girls flinch, but he decided to let it pass. Sakura had done the same thing to him before and he knew bringing it up would not make it any better.


	3. Chapter 2

The next morning at the Hotel California Embassy suit, Naruto jumped to a start as someone kicked him in the side.

"Hey! What was tha-"before naruto could finish, a hand clamped over his mouth. Naruto inhaled through his nose and prepared to bite when he recognized the smell. It was grassy, singed slightly, had high adrenaline, was covered in fan-girl-avoidance-sweat, and had a dark twist to it. Sasuke. Naruto bit down anyway, only to get chopped in the back of the head.

"Stay down, Naruto." Neji said as he splashed water in Naruto's face, bringing him back from unconsciousness before he actually got there. "It's just us." Neji didn't look happy and Sasuke didn't look surprised. "You were supposed to stay on guard from moon set to sunrise!" Neji whispered venomously, which, come to think of it, was very unlike Neji. He was usually caustic and aloof. "I guess I shouldn't be surprised, but I expected better after the way you've been improving." Getting lectured by Neji always reminded Naruto of his days at the academy, when it had been Iruka-sensei giving him the speeches on proper behavior.

"You got the third and last shift on guard duty and you failed," Sasuke pointed out, watching the windows of the guest's rooms, "the third shift is the easiest! You've already slept most of the night anyway!" One of the windows opened, and the boy with the yellow clothes leaned out of the window.

"Ah! The air here is so fresh! When they said there wouldn't be any of the 'polluting chemicals', I didn't realize you would be able to actually taste the difference!" He looked up at the tree Naruto and the other's were in, "And there are plants _everywhere_! They actually have trees inside the villa-Hey! …whatweretheirnames…Neji! Sasuke!...The other guy! What are you doing up in that tree?" He smiled at them jovially.

"Just taking an early morning nap, right Naruto?" Neji said pointedly.

"Yeah," Naruto laughed half-heartedly, "But the flies keep buzzing annoyingly, so I guess it's a good thing its only morning and we already got a night's sleep!" The yellow boy-Naruto suddenly remembered his name was Len-dropped out of the window frame and slipped back into the room.

"WILL YOU JUST SHUT-UP!" came the voice from inside the window, "NO, YOU CAN'T, CAN YOU? YOU JUST HAVE TO MAKE ENOUGH NOICE TO WAKE THE DEAD, DON'T YOU? SOME OF US ARE ACTUALLY TRYING TO SLEEP HERE!" The yellow girl, Ren, stuck her head out of the window. Before she could continue her rampage, however, there was a blur of teal and she was gone. Len's head came back into view, and he had the beginnings of a bruised eye.

"…uh, how about you guys meet us in the foyer in ten minutes?" Len seemed to be trying to cover up the conversation behind him, but years of ninja training had honed their senses and they could all three make out a conversation going on in a separate room than the one Len was in that had something to do about the amount of clothing-or lack thereof- someone was wearing. Naruto blushed and noticed that the other two were pointedly looking in different directions, meaning that they would be less likely to be able to hear the conversation in the background and instead would only hear what Len was saying.

"Of course," Neji called, "be there in ten minutes." And with that Sasuke and Neji left. Naruto jumped at their sudden disappearances and quickly jumped in a different direction.

Ten minutes later, Naruto, Neji, and Sasuke walked into the hotel's foyer and found that the Hidden Music Village ninjas were already there waiting for them. Kaito and Len were talking about something in whispers, and Ren and the teal one-Miku-the one Jeriah had wanted to meet-were sitting nearby, Ren blushing slightly. Naruto noticed Len's bruise had disappeared, but then he remembered how well Sakura could fix a full blown wound, let alone a little bruise, and figured one of them was a medical ninja of some sort.

"Good morning, guys," Kaito beamed as they walked over to him, "How are you doing on this bright, shiny day?"

"We are doing well, thank you." Neji replied, "But we should be the ones asking you that question, so how are you doing this pleasant morning?" Sasuke and Naruto began to glare at each other; it had been too long since the two had a fight and they were both waiting for the guests to leave so they could each send the other to lala land, or some nightmarish version thereof.

"We're doing great, you know what they say about fresh air." Kaito appeared to be more than just the leader of the squad, he appeared to be the glue that kept the thing together, and that made him the one they needed to impress the most. Neji decided to make sure that Kaito had not one thing to complain about when he left the Hidden Leaf Village. "Ah, I hope it's not too much trouble, but have you ever heard of 'ice-cream'?" As Kaito said this, the other three groaned plaintively.

"Here we go again…" Ryn sighed.

"Not again…" Lyn slouched.

"it's always ice-cream…" Miku cried.

Neji judged from the other three's reactions that this mysterious 'ice-cream' was something unpleasant.

"No, I don't believe I have. What is 'ice-cream'?" Neji asked. At this Kaito sighed and shook his head.

"It's nothing, I guess-" Neji realized that whatever it was, kaito wanted it, so neji decided he would find this 'ice-cream' or die trying.

"No, what is it? I'm curious now." As Neji said this, the other three groaned again, but kaito perked up visibly, as just thinking about it improved his mood.

"Ice-cream is the most delicious substance known to man!" Kaito began, sweeping his arms wide as if to encompass the world, "Ice-cream is the ambrosia of the Greece gods given form! It is the ultimatum of sweet, the fulcrum of sucrose, the cherry on top of dessert! It is LIFE!" Kaito now stood on top of the table that had been next to them when he had started, with his head thrown back in joyful daydreams of this sugary dessert. Miku kicked the table, unbalancing Kaito, who then jumped to regain his balance.

"Ice-cream is cream, milk, sugar, and various flavor-additives, blended together, then frozen into a yogurt-like substance that is hard when cold, but melts at room temperature." Miku said, kicking the table again when Kaito had almost regained his balance, causing him to go back to teetering.

Neji thought about what they had said for half a second, though thanks to Kaito's unbalanced state it was a long half second, and decided he would find some of this ice-cream for the visitors.

"Naruto, Sasuke. Please take care of our guests while I go get some Ice-cream for Kaito." Neji turned and saw the two staring each other down, "And no funny business or Lady Tsunade will personally have our heads!" as he said this Neji chopped both of them on the back of the neck on a particularly weak chakra point, just hard enough to jolt their nervous systems, and give them a minor headache for a few seconds.

"Ow! Why, I aughta-mph!" Sasuke clamped a hand over Naruto's mouth as the Hidden Music ninjas turned back around, Kaito finally getting off the table without falling.

"I'll get some ice-cream for you, in the meantime, please enjoy the hospitality of our village. As I said yesterday, Naruto and Sasuke will be your guides around the village. You aren't expected to work after spending the last several days travelling, after all. If you have any place in the village in mind you wish to visit, just ask one of these two and they'll take you there, otherwise, they will take you around all the sightseeing spots in the village. Now if you'll excuse me, I have ice-cream to collect." And with that Neji headed off in the direction of Choji's house.

"So, got anywhere in particular you want to visit? Or is this just a tour de Hidden Leaf Village?" Naruto smiled through the lingering headache, and Sasuke mentally cursed Naruto for distracting him so Neji could get him from behind.

"I've heard story after story of the great cliff faces of the Hidden Leaf Village, but you can never get the feel for how big they are from pictures. Can we go see them?" Ryn smiled, acting much more polite than she had previously. It made Naruto nervous, because that's when Sakura was most dangerous.

"Sure, we're actually not that far from the cliff. Follow me!" Naruto grinned and headed for the cliffs, the Hidden Music ninjas following him…

**I just finished this chapter and realized that I had not put a disclaimer yet, so the following disclaimer holds for the previous chapters and all the following chapters for the same story:**

**I do not own Naruto, nor do I own its characters, I am only using them for this fanfiction, and the same goes for the Vocaloids. Though I did come up with personalities for each of them, they are loosely based on the personalities given to them by their worldwide fanbase. Any OC characters that should appear in this story will be mine, and any resemblance to real people, other fictional characters, real places, other fictional places, ect. Is completely coincidental and I am terribly sorry.**

**And to all those who keep reviewing me to update: I was busy with family, homework, schoolwork-that-turned-into-homework, and writing this longer than average chapter because there didn't seem to be an end to it. I'm sorry it took me so long, but I write by inspiration more than anything else.**


	4. Chapter 3

Chapter 3

Jeriah sat on top of the 3rd hokage's head, using his peep-o-scope to watch as the beautiful Miku Hatsune walked up the steps to the viewing platform in front of the cliffs. He smiled like a devil with a chewtoy.

"Perfect! No-one can visit the Hidden Leaf Village without coming to see the Cliff Faces! This is my chance to prove that no-one can stop me from getting to a beautiful celebrity's autograph! Not even Naruto can mess up this plan!" Then Jeriah noticed something odd about the group. "Where's Neji?" Jeriah quickly put down the scope and looked around. "Curse that ocular jutsu…better change to plan L-37B…"

"Wow! It's incredible! I knew that they were cut out of the cliff, but I didn't realize what an undertaking it was till now!" Miku and Lyn ran ahead to the railing, viewing the cliffs from the front edge, while Ryn stepped back to the railing and watched the faces from the back edge. "How did you cut them out so perfectly? I would think if you cut a nostril, the nose would fall off!" Ryn wondered as she turned to Sasuke.

"The architects built structures to hold the stone in place, and the nostrils weren't actually drilled." Sasuke explained, crossing his arms and turning his back from the cliffs as if to say 'no big deal' "They just sanded an indention which from far away looks like the opening of a hole."

"Except for Old Man 3rd's!" Naruto jumped in, "His nostril's are actually tunnels that were already in the cliff, there's apparently an 'ak-oo-a-fur' in the ground a few miles back that will shoot water through the tunnels after heavy rains, making it look like the cliff has a runny nose!" Naruto beamed, standing way too close for comfort. Sasuke grabbed the back of Naruto's jumpsuit and yanked him back, throwing the the blonde paperweight across the viewing deck.

"It's called an aquifer, Loser." Sasuke growled, "And they blocked up the tunnels so that the water comes out elsewhere last week while you were busy chasing down that mailman with Jeriah!" Naruto quickly jumped back up and ran over to Sasuke.

"I don't care how you pronounce ak-oo-a-fur!" he grabbed Sasuke by the collar, "That's no reason to throw me half-way across the Village!" Kaito and Ryn just stared, dumbfounded, as Sasuke proceeded to knee Naruto in the groin so fast they almost missed it, and Naruto didn't even seem to move.

"I knew you were a wimpy Loser, but I didn't know you were a wimpy Loser girl." Sasuke looked just as surprised as the other two. Naruto didn't answer, he just stood there, giving Sasuke the 'I'm a crasy monster and I'm gonna kill you' look. Then suddenly Naruto doubled over and started bawling various versions of 'ow' and rolling back and forth, occasionally yelling 'low blow!' in between screams.

"… F'ing lag…" Ryn noted as Naruto slowly began to calm down. After some time, Naruto quit yelling altogether, and just layed there on the ground. "You gotta give him points for toughness, though…"

"How is that even possible?" Kaito asked, leaning over the crumpled orange heap. "Doesn't the human brain constantly receive signals from across the entire body? How can it choose what not to notice?" Naruto slowly got up, and leaned heavily on the railing.

"Sasuke…I'll…Kill you…for this…!" He gasped. Sasuke just turned his back on Naruto, unintentionally turning to face the cliffs.

"Uh…Naruto…" Sasuke said, taking a step closer to the cliff side railing, "What did you do this time?"

"What…do you mean?...I haven't…Done anything…" Naruto wheezed, turning around to look at Sasuke, Naruto saw what Sasuke was looking at. "That wasn't me…I haven't even been…in this direction…for a while…" In front of the six ninjas, the cliffs were rumbling, as water poured out of the third hokage's face's nose.

"They blocked it up, so why is it pouring?" Sasuke wondered, stepping up all the way to the front railing, "After all, it hasn't even rained in weeks!" Naruto and the Hidden Music ninjas stepped up behind him.

"I don't know," Naruto wheezed, "But nobody messes up Old Man Third's statue but me!" with that, the apparently completely recovered Naruto jumped over the railing and across the gap, landing on a tree half-way between the platform and the cliffs themselves. Sasuke turned to the music ninjas.

"Naruto is such an idiot. There are plenty of other ninjas to take care of it, and we're supposed to focus on taking care of you." Sasuke sighed resignedly, "If I chase after him, can you keep up with me?" Sasuke doubted anyone could keep up with an Uchiha, but then again there were freaks like Lee…

"Of course!" Miku smiled, "He isn't all that fast, anyway." The other music ninjas nodded. "It's almost as if he's wounded. Keeping up won't be a problem!" Sasuke let himself grin. _I asked if they could keep up with me, not Naruto. They're in for a surprise! _

"Ok, follow me. And stay close! If you can keep up, I'm not going to lollygag for you!" and with that, Sasuke turned and mid turn jumped over the railing, landing three quarters of the way to the cliffs. As he jumped off of the tree, Sasuke noticed some shadows fly over him, and when he looked up; he saw the music ninjas landing at the cliffs, obviously skipping the trees between entirely. "Crap!" and Sasuke kicked it up a notch, putting as much speed as he could into his movements, determined to catch up with Naruto before the super-jumping ninjas did.

"Perfect. They're heading straight to the cliffs, with Sasuke in last. It's just as planned…" a voice in the shadows smiled, "They think they can have a day off? Not while I'm around! Fufufu!"

**For English-only readers, fufufu is Japanese for Muahaha. And you call yourself Otaku…**


	5. Chapter 4

**It has come to my attention that the proffered way to spell the Kagamine twins' names are Rin and Len, so I will be using them from now on. Sorry for the error. And before you point it out, proffered is a word, it is like saying the given way. To proffer something is to offer it. Now that we're done with English class, on to the story:**

As the Hidden Music ninjas arrived at the cliffs, they saw that the water had stopped pouring, but a team of Hidden Leaf ninjas had arrived and seemed to be doing the same thing they were; staring dumbfounded at the face's nose.

"Naruto!" a ninja with his hair pulled back in a bushy ponytail, yelled at, you guessed it, Naruto, "What in the world did you do this time?" The ninja had a scar perpendicular to his nose, and made his otherwise youthful face stern. Naruto turned to him with squinted eyes.

"I didn't do anything, Iruka-sensei! I've been on an escort mission with Sasuke and Neji all day!" Naruto complained, standing right in front of Iruka. Rin stepped up to the older ninja.

"I don't know why you think Naruto is the one who did it, but I can guarantee that it wasn't him, because he has been escorting us around your village for the last day since noon!" Ryn stood next to the tall ninja, not showing the slightest intimidation from the fact that he was several feet taller than her.

"Oh, ok…wait, you're the Hidden Music ninjas that are here as ambassadors for the Land of Voices?" Iruka's eyebrows rose as he spoke, "I'm so sorry for the inconvenience." He turned to Naruto. "Why didn't you tell me you were on that mission? You could have saved us both a lot of trouble. Besides, I'm proud of you! This is a pretty important mission. Don't screw it up!" Iruka turned back to the Hidden Music ninjas and continued to give apologies for the trouble he'd caused. About that time Sasuke caught up.

"What…do you…people do…to go so…FAST!" Sasuke gasped, trying to catch his breath, "and that ….goes for you….also, Naruto…!" Sasuke looked like he was about to fall over from exhaustion. Miku stepped over and checked on him while Kaito walked over to Iruka.

"It's no big deal!" Kaito smiled, "After all, you were only doing your job. Our guides here had just finished explaining how the tunnels in the cliff had been closed off last week to prevent this from happening. Do you know why the tunnels were flooding again?" Iruka smiled half-heartedly, and turned back to the cliff face where several other jounin were examining the nostrils and some of the water that had poured out.

"I honestly don't know." Iruka was obviously trying to keep a cheerful face on. "But it was probably just a leak in one of the blockages, and will have to be fixed up. Now that the collected water has all passed, it shouldn't start again until after it rains, which shouldn't be for another week, if the weatherman is to be beleived." Iruka smiled and turned to the others. "If you'll excuse me, I need to get back to work now." As Iruka walked off, water began to pour out of the nose again, knocking several of the jounin who had been examining it off.

"Um, I thought you said it wouldn't start pouring again for another week." Len pointed out. Iruka was just standing there, speechless. "Maybe there is something else going on?" Len offered hopefully.

"There are a whole bunch of cat-a-combs back there!" Naruto pointed out, "But the only exits are the tunnels the water used to come through, and another which comes out in the middle of the forest a few miles outside the village. There's nowhere that water could be coming from." Naruto explained as the others looked on worriedly. Rin turned to Naruto and said;

"You sure seem to know a lot about these caves, Naruto. Do all Leaf Village ninjas study the cliffs?" Naruto blinked, and Iruka turned slightly towards them and mumbled as if he wasn't really paying attention to them.

"No, nobody studies the cliffs themselves, only the history behind the carving of them…" then he turned back to the cliffs.

"So, how do you know them so well?" Rin asked, "Are they special to you?" Sasuke laughed and turned to look at Rin.

"Yeah, really important. They're so important to him that he once covered the whole cliff with graffiti when no-one was looking!" Sasuke laughed some more, and then got serious. "Come to think of it, you did actually spend a lot of time around here, didn't you Naruto. So you would be the person to best know the insides of the cliffs, right? Maybe if we went in there you could figure out what's going on." Upon hearing this, Iruka seemed to snap out of it and turned to the others.

"No, you're on a mission to protect the ambassadors! It's too dangerous to go spelunking in caves where things are obviously not normal, and you're mission is much too important to be put on hold while you deal with what is effectively a water leak!" at this Miku smiled and turned to Sasuke.

"What were the words of your mission exactly?" Miku asked and had a devious look on her face.

"Our mission is to 'help them find their way around the village, take them to all the tourist spots, and in general do anything they need you to do'." Sasuke quoted Shizune, and Miku's smile got bigger. "Why does the exact wording matter?"

"Because your mission is to be our guides, not to keep us from going anywhere or to protect us. Which is actually a good thing anyway, because we can take care of ourselves. But my point is, if we decide we want to go explore the caves behind the cliff faces, your orders mean you have to come with us, not to stop us from going!" As she explained everyone's faces except Iruka's lit up, and Iruka's drooped. Miku turned to the other Hidden Music ninjas. "And I don't know about you, but I want to go explore the caves behind the cliffs!"

"Hell yeah!" Rin crowed.

"Of Course!" Kaito beamed.

"Sure, I guess." Len shrugged apprehensively.

"All right! Out of the way, Iruka-sensei! We have to complete our mission, beleive it!" Naruto walked passed a dejected Iruka.

"After all, our mission is far too important to shirk for a few hours!" Sasuke smirked, glad to finally be doing something that was actually exciting.

Back, behind the yellow tape set up by the jounin who had been examining the cliff faces, Kabuto smiled and pushed his glasses farther up his nose.

"Exactly as Lord Orochimaru predicted…the Hidden Music ninjas are going into the cliffs escorted by Naruto and Sasuke." He turned and began walking away from the cliffs, towards the hole in the base of the cliffs a half-mile past the faces that he and the other Hidden Sound ninjas had been working on for the last 3 weeks. "He'll be pleased, and even more so when he finds out that Jeraiah still uses the same names for all his 'get-a-date' plans. They'll all walk right into my trap."

**What are kabuto's traps? What is Iruka so dejected about? Will Len aver gain some self-confidence? Find out next time on VLV! Sorry I couldn't help myself. Credit goes to Dragon Ball Z for the beginning of this paragraph. I do not own them, nor they me.**


	6. Chapter 5

**Too all my avid fans: sorry for the big delay, but there was inclement weather in Dallas, so I was locked at home with no computer access, so I was unable to write this last week. To make it up to you, this chapter is extra long and in my not-really-expert opinion, a 'warm-and-fuzzy-makes-emos-feel-like-life-is-worth-living' chapter with some beautiful scenes. Again, I am sorry for the massive delay, but unlike Camp Dierk's Scout Camp, I do not have a direct line to God… Enjoy!**

Len sneezed as he tripped over yet another rocky outcropping. _Where are they? Sis was just in front of me a moment ago, and now I can't even see my feet again! If only I could be so energetic like Naruto, then I could just jump all over the place and not only keep up, but leave everyone else in my dust! If only…_Len tripped over another rock and hit his head.

"Ow! Ow! OW! Owowow! …ow! Ow!" the walls echoed with Lin's cry, and after a minute, Len felt a preseance next to him.

"Get up, crybaby." Rin whispered as she kicked him in the side. "You don't want to get left behind, do you?" Rin picked up the winded Len and tossed him over her shoulder. "The things I do for you… " Rin grumbled irritably as she carried Len back to the others, wishing the clutz hadn't interrupted her time with Naruto. "He must have tripped and winded himself!" Rin called as the others turned to her, "He's almost unconscious." Naruto walked over and checked on him, with Kaito right next to him.

"I'm no medical ninja, but I know injuries pretty well." Naruto explained, "It feels like he's got a cracked rib, but otherwise he should be ok. You in there, Len?" the young genin coughed, and then tried to get up.

"Yeah, I'm fi-OW! I mean I'm fine!" Len winced as his cracked rib poked him. The Rin and Sasuke stared at him as if to say 'yeah, right'.

"You're going to need a bandage, but for now you're just going to have to deal with it." Kaito told him, "We'll bandage it up when we get out of here. Try and stay with the rest of the group. It's a bit dangerous deep in caves like this." As Kaito finished speaking, the ninjas heard a rumbling in the distant caves.

"Naruto, what is that?" Rin cried, though she already had an idea. "That's not a flood like what was pouring out the cliffs before we came in, was it?" Naruto's eyes had already bulged, and now he turned towards an alcove a little ways ahead of the group.

"Quick, everybody over here!" Naruto yelled, his voice almost drowned out by the rumbling which was getting louder by the second. Everyone began running for the alcove Naruto had entered, and found that it was actually much shallower than the entrance made it look.

"Naruto! Shouldn't we be in a deeper hole?" Sasuke yelled, as the noise kept getting louder.

"No!" Naruto explained loudly, "The shallower the better! That way the water has more trouble getting behind us!" Miku opened her mouth to ask a question, but then the water arrived.

It was like a wall of water, and it quickly expanded to fill all the space that there was room for in the catacomb-like caves, and then plunged past the alcove the ninjas were hiding in. the water seemed like it was a liquid glass, flowing rapidly past their little alcove in the wall of the caves. They could see clearly all the way to the other side of the tunnel, were there were several etches of air do to edges of the cave. From across the water, it looked like streams of silver pouring along through the water. Then the multitude of fish started going by. Humongous fish with giant flippers, microscopic fish that looked like beads of color amongst the others, robust red fish that looked like a living sunset, beautiful blue fish that seemed to be part of the water themselves, bright yellow fish that looked like pieces of sun, all kinds of fish in the underground river flowed past them in a kaleidoscope of vibrant color.

"Wow" Rin sighed, her voice completely drowned out by the water, "It's so beautiful…" Rin looked at the others, and they all had similar looks of wonder on their faces, even Sasuke. Naruto's was the best though, the way his face lit up even more than usual, and the blue light from the water made his orange clothes and yellow hair really seem to glow.

Then the water was gone. As fast as it had come and all that was left was the dying rumbles as the water passed through the caves behind.

"That was incredible!" Miku cried, "I've never seen anything like it!" As they un-compacted themselves out of the alcove, they all couldn't help but smiling.

"Yeah, right after rainy days, that was the best part. Even better than a rainbow." Naruto reminisced, then became a little more serious, or in Naruto's case; less serious "There were never fish in it though! I guess they thought it would be a fun ride! Like a roller coaster! WEEEEH ha-ha! Anyway, let's get going. It looked like the water is still coming from where it did before the blockage." Naruto turned and lead the way through the again dark tunnels deep within the cliff faces…

*time passes*

"Hold on, I need a break." Len cried. _I can't believe this. I can't let myself pull the others back, but I'm to weak to keep up, and my rib keeps hurting every time I step! If only I had just kept walking earlier, Sis wouldn't have kicked me. I bet my ribs were fine until then!_ Len sat down and glanced at the angry look on Rin's face. "Sorry. I'm trying to keep up, honest."

"It's ok." Kaito said, not seeing Rin's face in the dark, "You're injured from before. We can't expect you to be able to keep up forever." Len smiled. Kaito always knew just what to say to make him feel better. _He may say that his only love is ice-cream, but he's the ideal father none of us had…_

"Yeah. I didn't want to be the first to admit it, but I'm worn out too." Sasuke sighed as he sat down where he had been standing. "I'm not used to this kind of spelunking, and on top of that you Music ninjas are fast. You jump fast, you walk fast, you even think fast. I'm the fastest of the Leaf Village Genin, not including Lee, and you're all giving me a run for my money." Sasuke leaned back against the tunnel wall. "It's funny, but when you get down here, with thousands of pounds of rock in every direction, there's this peace that I haven't felt since Itachi…" Sasuke's face dropped and his voice cut off.

"Itachi?" Miku turned to Sasuke from where she was sitting. "Where have I heard that name before?" Sasuke seemed like he wasn't going to answer for a long time, and Naruto tried to find a way to change the subject, but then Sasuke spoke;

"Itachi Uchiha. My brother. When I was a little kid, I came home one night to find my entire clan massacred. They had all been killed. Even worse, they were killed by one of their own, Itachi. He then came to me and when I tried to kill him he told me that because I couldn't kill him, I would have to suffice with hating him. Then he left. I've been training since that day as much as a could so the day I catch up to him, I can make him pay for what he did to our clan." Sasuke told the story with almost no emotion till the very end, where he sat on the ground and began to cry silently. "He killed all of them…and he didn't even have a reason why. He just KILLED THEM!" Naruto and Miku sat down on either side of him. Neither touched him, but their presence was enough. This was the first time he had actually cried about it since the actuall night. He usually focused on his rage and the fact that he was an Uchiha; an elite. But here, in the peaceful quiet of the cave, he couldn't hold it anymore.

_And I thought I had it bad._ Len thought, looking at the three sitting down. _I always just sit down and give up. I never seem to be able to keep myself going. But I at least have friends and Sis. His whole family was wiped out and he's not just whining about it. He's not using it as an excuse; he's actually using it to drive him even more._

"If only I could be like that…if that happened to me I wouldn't be able to take it…" Len sighed to himself, or at least he meant to. As he said it, Naruto looked up at him.

"Careful about that phrase. You know the song about saying 'if only', don't you?" The Music ninjas all looked at Naruto with confused faces. Sasuke wiped his eyes on his sleeve and, feeling better now, looked up at Naruto as well.

"No, I've never heard about a song that's about 'if only'." Rin sayed, "How does it go?" Naruto smiled and sang the slightly melancholy tune;

"If only, if only, the woodpecker sighs,

The bark on the trees was as soft as the skies,

The wolf waits below, hungry and lonely,

He cries to the moon, if only, if only…"

"That's so beautiful…" Rin sighed, "I've never heard that before…" Miku stood up and stretched exaggeratedly, and pointed down the tunnel in the direction they had been headed.

"It makes a good point too. We better get going before we get caught in another wave of water." Miku smiled and held out a hand to help Sasuke up. Sasuke took it, as Rin did the same for Naruto, and Len tried to help her until she violently elbowed him in the cracked rib.

**DISCLAIMER: I do not own the 'if only' song. It is from the book 'Holes' a very good book, but I don't own it, so please don't sue me.**


	7. Chapter 6

**Here's celebrating 2,731 words, a new chapter length record! Almost twice that of previous chapters, we get the opinion of the exhausted Machina: "how was it writing a chapter so much larger than what you usually write?" Machina: "It was both difficult, and easy. I usually just write until I feel like I've reached the end. It has nothing to do with the length of the chapter, but more to do with the tension level. In fact, this is the first chapter that didn't have a 'cool down point' right before the end, because it felt right to leave the reader hanging, so they could sit back and go 'OMG I DIDN'T SEE THAT COMING'. Because this is going at the beginning of the chapter, I don't want to spoil it for the reader, so that's all I'm saying on that."**

"How much farther till we reach the blockage?" Miku asked from near the back of the line. They had been travelling for some time now, and it was beginning to seem as if they would be walking forever.

"I honestly don't know." Naruto called back from the lead. "I mean, I wasn't here when they blocked it up in the first place. But I know where I would put the block if I had done it, and that's just a few more minutes ahead of us. There is this huge cavern and right after it the tunnel shrinks to almost nothing, and it would take almost no trouble at all to block it up there." Naruto smiled, forgetting that no-one could see facial expressions in the rear black darkness of the caves. "We're just three or four turns away from the cavern now!"

"Is there something special about this cavern?" Ryn asked from right behind him, "I mean this seems to be a long way to travel just to see a particular cave…" As she spoke, Ryn tripped on a ripple in the smooth floor. Sasuke, who was right behind her, jumped foreword and caught her.

"You ok?" Sasuke asked, just in time to get a fist in the face from his would be rescue-ee.

"I can catch myself, thank you!" Ryn jeered, following up with a chop to Sasuke's stomach, and causing him to trip himself on the same ripple Ryn had. As he fell, Miku stepped up from her spot in line behind them and caught Sasuke.

"Easy, Ryn! He was just trying to help!" Miku barked, helping Sasuke regain his footing. "Are you ok?" Sasuke wiped the blood from his split lip before Miku could see it.

"Yeah, I'm fine." He lied, "She just caught me off guard, is all." Kaito finished helping Len up to the last ridge and jogged up to the irritated kunoichi.

"Easy, girls. No need to get so edgy. After all, if someone gets hurt, we're stuck so far back here it will be a while before we can get help." Kaito wisely chose to avoid mentioning that fighting over Sasuke wouldn't make him like them any more than he already did.

"Yes, Kaito-sensei." The two responded simultaneously, unintentionally creating a harmony.

"We're almost there," Naruto called back, "Let's get up ahead. There's light in the cavern ahead, so we won't have to worry about tripping!" As he turned back to the front, a voice echoed from ahead:

"SUMMONING JUTSU! OCEAN CURRENTS!" Suddenly the rumbling that they had all learned meant incoming water reverberated throughout the caves, louder than it had ever been before. Naruto spun around and ran back towards the rest of the group.

"RUN!" Naruto screamed as he literally leapt over Sasuke, "THERE ISN'T A GOOD PLACE TO HIDE NEARBY! WE'RE GONNA HAVE TO HEAD BACK TO THAT RIDGE!" No-one needed a second warning as the all ran after Naruto, except for Len, who was in front of Naruto, and only had time to turn around before Naruto passed him, picking the young Genin up as he raced past.

Naruto and Len were the first to get to the ridge, and Miku was right behind them, but then the water came around the next bend, and it looked like it was going to run over the remaining ninja. Kaito arrived at the ridge then, followed shortly by Ryn, but Sasuke was still a ways behind, cursing the day he tried to catch Ryn. The water was practically on top of him when Miku jumped out from behind the ridge, one hand held to her headphones, and began to sing.

"Mou ikiba ga nai wa

kono koi no netsuryou

AHH…"

As she hit the final note, Miku yelled, and out of her mouth came not just the note, but a visible wave of sound. The Teal Wave flew past Sasuke without touching him, and ran full on into the water. The water halted, held in place by the power of Miku's voice. The note ended, but the water stayed frozen in place, unable to move, appearing to be glass. Miku stumbled over to the nearest wall and leaned against it heavily.

"Huff…huff…hurry…I can't hold it forever…Are you ok…?" Miku gasped, barely able to stay standing. Sasuke nodded, and put his arm over her shoulder as he helped her get back to the ridge. As they sat down beneath the ridge, Miku made a hand sign, and the water roared overhead and past them. Naruto's eyes were bugged out as he turned to Miku.

"What was that? You held the water in place with just your voice? I've never seen anything like that! How did you do it?" Naruto's eyes were bugging out as he laid question after question on the breathless Miku. Sasuke hit Naruto on the back of the head, cutting him off mid sentence.

"Back off, Naruto. Give her a chance to catch her breath." Sasuke pointed out to the slightly chastened Naruto. After Miku had caught her breath, she turned to Sasuke.

"Thanks for holding him off." She then turned to Naruto. "That was a special kind of jutsu called 'sound style' that the ninjas of the Hidden Music Village specialize in. It's very hard to master because it requires a lot of discipline to control both chakra flow and voice tone at the same time, but if you can maintain it, it can be very powerful. Its only weakness is that it requires the one performing the jutsu to be able to create musical notes, so if we are gagged we are unable to perform most of our techniques. As you saw, it also requires a lot of energy and the more sustained jutsus can leave a person drained afterwards." The water had stopped by the time Miku finished her explanation, so they all got up and started heading forward again.

"So, you can all do stuff like that?" Naruto asked the music ninjas, "What else can you do, besides stopping massive walls of water?" Ryn blushed slightly as she answered his question.

"Well, not exactly. Just like there are different styles of music, there are also different styles of sound style jutsu. Miku is actually an expert in Electronica music, so her jutsu are usually more like genjutsu, but as you saw, she also has other talents, and her signature Teal Wall jutsu usually destroys anything in its path. I specialize in more traditional styles of music, and my sound jutsu are 'sound sword' style, where the notes turn into blades that cut the air." As she spoke Len looked at her, like he was hurt. "Oh, and Len is a moderate traditional style singer as well, and uses similar sound jutsu. Kaito is a jounin, so he is an expert in all kinds of music, and I've never seen him show preference for any kind of style. He just seems to be good at everything." Sasuke stayed silent throughout both explanations, but now spoke up.

"Hey, Naruto. Before the water came, we heard a voice calling out a summoning jutsu. It sounded kind of familiar, but I can't quite place it…" Naruto frowned and thought hard, squinting his eyes so they looked closed.

"…hmm…now that you mentioned it, it did. But the way it echoed around the tunnels it was distorted too much and I couldn't recognize it either…" Naruto smiled mischievously. "But it sounded like it was coming from the big cavern I was telling you about, so we'll probably get to sneak up on them!" After this they all remained silent as they snuck up on the opening ahead of them, with dim, pale green light pouring out of it. As they got closer, their carefully trained ears detected the heavy breathing of someone somewhere in the cavern.

As they looked around the corner, Naruto and Ryn, who were the two in the front, saw that the cavern was huge, big enough to hold the entire Hokage's building and still have room to spare. It was filled with growths of crystal which seemed to be the source of the aquamarine light that filled the cavern, giving the sense that the whole place was underwater. There were stalagmites all across the cave, made of blue-grey stone which looked like pillars, giving the two the impression that they were in a grand entry hall instead of a cave deep under the earth.

In the middle of the cave, surrounded by a summoning circle inscribed in the rock floor, was Jiraiya.

"PERVY SAGE!" Naruto yelled, as the others snuck up behind them, causing Len and Sasuke to both jump and hit their heads on the low roof, "You're the one causing all this water!" As Naruto yelled, Jiraiya jumped as well, and looking in their direction smiled like a monkey with a banana.

"Naruto. Good to see you. And I see you brought your VIPs as well. How I have waited for this moment!" As Sasuke and Len rubbed the quickly rising bumps on their heads, they group filed out into the cavern. Naruto was livid, yelling how Jiriaya was on purpose trying to make him fail his mission, and how he had been told to stay away. Jiriaya seemed to ignore him, as he walked strait past the ranting ninja towards the others.

"Oh, no you don't!" Naruto yelled and grabbed Jiraiya by the back of his hair, and yanked him back. "My mission is to keep people like you away from Ryn and the others, and I'm gonna finish my mission with flying colors! Do you hear me?" Jiraiya tossed his head, throwing Naruto on the ground in front of him. Jiraiya had taken on that mentor appearance that usually meant he was being serious for once.

"Naruto. I'm disappointed in you. Yes, I sometimes have a reputation of being…uncivil around beautiful women. But you don't think I would jeopardize the reputation of the leaf village over something like that, do you? I can control myself when I have too." Jiraiya sniffed as if he were a noble who had found something disdainful in front of him. Naruto just stared at him, his face making his thoughts clear: "Yeah, Right." Back near the entrance to the cave, the music ninjas plus Sasuke watched with a stunned silence, which Kaito was the first to break.

"Um, Sasuke. Who is that old man, and why is Naruto determined to not let him nervous? Is he a rogue ninja?" Kaito had stepped in front of the others, ready to jump in if a fight started. Sasuke gave a short laugh, and seeing the even more confused faces, began explaining.

"No, he's not a rogue ninja. In fact he's one of the three Sanin. His name is Jiraiya, and while he's a powerful ninja, he's also a notorious pervert. He and Naruto have a sort of mentor-student relationship, but Naruto is actually the more serious of the two. Most of the time Jiraiya can be found inside the ladies side of the hot springs, or on a rooftop nearby using a telescope to look in. As you can understand, we have specific orders to keep him away from your group while you visit." As Sasuke explained, Miku frowned slightly.

"Jiraiya…I've heard that name before. It's not the Sanin, though I am familiar with them. It's on the edge of my memory, give me a moment…" Miku closed her eyes and her frown deepened, as she concentrated hard on tracing the thought down. "Has something to do with writing…author of a book…Jiraya…!" Miku's eyes opened like saucers, and immediately closed again "NO! Not that!" Miku clamped her hands on her ears and she closed her eyes again, except this looked like she was trying NOT to think of something. The other music ninjas looked at her a moment, then they're eyes began to light up, and they quickly jumped Miku, holding her down.

"You are Miku Hatsune, do you hear me! HATSUNE!" Kaito yelled in her ear. Miku seemed to go into a seizer, and though Sasuke jumped in and tried to get one of them to explain what was going on, they all seemed to focused on Miku to notice.

The commotion attracted the attention of Naruto and Jiraiya, who over to see what the problem was, Naruto forgetting his earlier comments about not letting Jiraiya near. As they got closer, Sasuke looked at Jiraiya, giving up on asking the others what was happening.

"What did you do?" Sasuke asked the Toad Sage, who just stared with a confused look.

"I don't know. I didn't do anything. My plan only went as far as you arriving." Jiraiya tried to help hold Miku still, but Ryn gave him an uppercut which knocked him all the way back to the summoning circle.

"Sasuke," Naruto turned to his teammate, "What happened?"

"I don't know. She said Jiraiya's name sounded familiar, and she focused for a moment, trying to figure out why, then she suddenly freaked out and then fell into a seizer. I tried to get them to tell me, but they're too focused to listen." The two talked hurriedly, even though there was nothing either of them could do because of the limited space between the sound ninjas. Jiraiya, returning with a bloody nose, stopped well back from the commotion.

"What? You're saying this happened because she was trying to remember me? But we've never met!" Jiraiya, like the other two, was talking both hurriedly and loud, the urgency of the others conveying itself too all of them.

"Then she most know of you" Sasuke yelled, "What could it be?" Jiraiya looked even more confused at that.

"The only reputations I have are as a Sanin, Naruto's nickname for me, and of course my books." Jiraiya pointed out, giving Naruto a dirty look when he got to the nickname. At the mention of books, Sasuke had a lightbulb moment.

"Author! She said something about an author! What books have you written?" At this Naruto and Jiraiya both looked at Sasuke like he was an alien.

"You mean to tell me you don't know his books?" Naruto questioned Sasuke, "I mean, Kakashi is always reading them for goodness sake!" At this Sasuke looked at Jiraiya with surprise.

"You wrote…"

"Yes, I wrote the Make Out Series! I-" but before Jiraiya had finished the thought there was a scream from Miku, followed by a burst of Black and Red light which threw the other music ninjas back.

As everyone looked into the slowly dimming light, the music ninjas all began to freak out.

"Oh, crap. We were too late!"

"Not this! Anything but this!"

"Not her! She's too strong!"

As the light finished dimming, the on looking ninjas could make out a figure standing in the middle of it. It looked like Miku's silhouette, but it was holding a katana in the right hand, and a giant axe in the left. The light was gone now, and they could tell it was not the Miku who had come through the caves with them. This Miku had black hair, and all the blue on her outfit had been replaced with black. Her skirt, Jiraiya noted wolfishly, had shortened an inch or two as well, and while her top resembled Miku's sleeveless school uniform outfit, this black Miku had a lowered neckline, so that it more resembled a dress, but still had a collar and tie that neither of which were attached to the dress in any visible way. Her eyes were a deep blood red, and it was as though there was no soul behind them whatsoever.

"Who are you! And what did you do to Miku!" Naruto yelled at the black and red stranger.

"I am MIku," said the figure, her voice deeper and huskier than Miku's. "Miku Zatsune!"

**Disclaimer: the song Miku sings to stop the water is the first few lines of Love is War. I do not own it, nor possess any rights to it. Please do not sue me. Miku Zatsune is a creation of Hatsune fans, and is also not one of my possessions. The weapons come from a GIF by dimona93 on photobucket called " Zatsune scythe thingy".**

**It came to my attention, due to a friend's reviewing, that I was misspelling Jiraiya's name, so in this chapter and all following chapters I will attempt to use the correct spelling.**


	8. Chapter 7

"I am Miku," the figure purred, "Miku Zatsune!" The music ninjas jumped over to where the other three were.

"Quick! We can't let her get out of here! She's a demon of pure malice!" Kaito yelled at the leaf ninjas. Zatsune laughed at this, and began a slow jog across the huge cave that quickly picked up speed.

"Malice? I'm not Malice! I'm a demon of DESTRUCTION!" Zatsune crooned as she jumped at Ryn, swinging the huge axe like it was a toothpick. Ryn leaped out of the way, but only just barely as the axe hit the ground so hard it created a crater in the floor and sent a shockwave outwards. Slowly at first, but more surely, they began to realize that Zatsune was singing under her breath, and a miasma of red and black chackra began to envelope her as she chased whichever of the ninjas was closest, either trying to crush them with her giant axe or slice them in two with her overlong katana.

**For the readers who are familiar with vocaloid music, Zatsune is singing Love Love Nightmare. However, this song has no discernable words, so I can't put some of the lyrics here.**

"Naruto!" Sasuke yelled, as he dodged yet another axe blow, "Tag Team! Kakashi won't see this coming number 35!" Sasuke new Naruto would know what he was talking about, but was worried that the others might get caught in the blast. It was a relatively recent technique, and they hadn't worked the kinks out of it yet.

"I hear you!" Naruto yelled, smiling as he thought of getting to show off his tactical genius to Ryn. "Here I COME!" Naruto yelled as he ran foreword, and then created five shadow clones. The Narutos quickly began to spread out and fly at Zatsune from several different angles. Zatsune moved in a strange, helter-skelter gait that made it hard for them to predict where she was headed next, but it didn't matter, because they were able to surround her and then they all jumped in at once.

Zatsune saw what they were planning, it wasn't very secretive after all, and came to a halt mid spin, one foot held strait down, the other held off the ground, keeping her center of balance. The Dark Miasma began to get thicker, and right before the Narutos got to her, it exploded outward in streams of red and Black light. Two of the Narutos were hit by the light instantly and were gone in a puff of smoke, but the remaining four kept coming and made their attack.

The first two Narutos to get all the way to Zatsune were made well acquainted with the business end of the axe as Zatsune spun on the toes of the foot still on the ground for no visible reason and chopped them in four.

The third, thinking her both off balance after her rapid spin and distracted by the two before, shot at her back and attempted to hit her with a kunai held in a reverse grip, but right before he got there, out of no-where the katana slid between the shadow clone's eyes.

As the third clone went up in smoke, the final Naruto saw that both weapons were occupied and the spinning was at the point where it was on the slow down, and she was at the 'recovery period' of the move, and took the opening. He jumped over the miasma waves and came at Zatsune from above, and she wasn't even looking in his direction.

Suddenly, Zatsune's free leg shot up, and snapped into Naruto's chin, making a loud cracking noise as his neck broke. The body fell to the ground, and the rest of the room fell silent. The miasma died down then, and Zatsune brought the raised leg down and returned to a normal standing position, and laughed.

"Is this the best you leaf ninja can come up with? Five shadow clones coming in your basic surrounding strike maneuver? I mean look, this poor fellow got himself killed over it!" Zatsune jeered at the heartbroken ninjas. "What kind of tag team is it that you don't involve yourself in, Sasuke?" Zatsune pointed out, and then did a double take. "Where is he?" Sasuke was gone, having disappeared during the confusion of the miasma streams and the smoke from the dead shadow clones. From behind her back, Zatsune heard a whisper.

"Back here!" As Zatsune spun around, she felt it was too late. If he had bothered to reveal where he was, he was already about to get her.

"You Bastard!" Zatsune had time to breath as she finished spinning-

-and found nothing. Then from somewhere far enough away to create an echo, they all heard Sasuke call out.

"Fire Style: Pheonix Flower Jutsu!" and in an explosion of energy, Zatsune began to wave her weapons around in lightning speeds, blocking balls of fire that kept coming out of random holes in the cave walls. To the still stunned bystanders, she looked like a fire dancer, spinning her burning sticks around in mesmerizing loops.

But not all of them were willing to sit back and let things go by without some personal payback. Ryn focused on the movements, and when she thought she had them down, began singing her own jutsu.

"machi-akari hanayaka

EETERU masui no tsumetasu

memure nai gozen niji

subete ga kyuusoku ni kawaru

OIRU gire no RAITAA

yaketsuku youna ino naka

subete ga sou uso nara

hontou ni yokatta noni ne

kimi no kubi o shimeru yume o mita

hikari no afureru hiru sagari

kimi no hosoi nodo ga haneru no o

nakidashi souna mede miteita…"

With each note, a blade of yellow chackra flew from her mouth at Zatsune. But Zatsune just seemed to speed up and blocked them as well. Then Len added his voice as well, and then the blades were bigger, and had taken on a slightly orange tint.

Just when it looked like they had her, Zatsune released another wave of Miasma Streams. The noise created was disharmonious, and the blades fizzled out along with the Miasma. But Zatsune was still strong as she deflected fireball after fireball.

Jiraiya decided it was his turn to join the fight, and ran over to the summoning circle on the ground. He'd never used it for combat purposes, but he knew the theory of it. It was technically water style, which he wasn't proficient with, but he was good enough for this.

"Summoning Jutsu: Ocean Currents Shockwave!" as the water burst forth from the circle, Jiriaya was careful to keep it away from the tunnels, knowing that Sasuke wouldn't be able to use a fire style through the wall of water. The wave of water was really just a giant stream of saltwater, and didn't even fill up half the cavern. Jiraiya, using chakra strings that were unwittingly very similar to those used by puppet ninjas, led the wall of water around the cavern once, then sent it strait at the occupied Zatsune.

As the Kagamine twins recovered from the chakra disruption Zatsune had caused, and Kaito made his own plans, the song Zatsune was murmuring changed, and with recognition, Kaito quickly ran to the twins and created a human wall between them and the oncoming jutsu.

And he just in time as Zatsune hit the last note of the same phrase Miku had used to stop the water in the caverns before. But unlike Hatsune's, this Black Wave didn't just stop the water. It blew through it like it wasn't there. The shockwave spread in all directions, creating cracks in the walls throughout the room, and knocking Kaito and the twins to the ground with enough force to leave the twins breathless and Kaito unconscious.

As Jiraiya looked on, stunned at the force of the blast, having been protected by the water being in the way, he heard a voice speak up behind him.

"Jiraiya. I see you're still just as inefficient with water styles as ever." Orochimaru said, stepping up so he was in the light.

"Orochimaru! What do you want! Did you do this?" Jiraiya was already worn out from the massive use of summoning jutsu he had done that day, but he wasn't about to let him know that. "Whatever you've done here, undo it before I make you!" Orochimaru laughed.

"Jiraiya, Jiraiya. You always jump to conclusions. I didn't do anything. I just came for the show. My spies had told me of this 'Miku Zatsune' and I wanted to see her for myself. She'll be a fine addition to my sound ninja." Orochimaru made a miniscule gesture with his hand, but Jiraiya was watching for it, and quickly moved to get away from where he was standing, only to feel a hand on his shoulder. "Unfortunately for you, your part in this show has already ended. I just needed you to trigger the transformation. Now take a good long nap, I assure you Sasuke and Miku will be in good hands." As Jiraiya tried to resist, he felt his limbs become heavy as a sleeping genjutsu worked its way into his mind.

"Nighty night, Jiraiya." Kabuto grinned, as he slowly let the unconscious Sanin to the floor.

Meanwhile, the fight had never stopped. Sasuke had heard the shockwave, but because of the walls of stone between him and her, he hadn't been affected, but stopped the stream of fireballs, anyway. He hadn't done it this long in some timeand he was beginning to run out of chakra. He had to conserve his energy for getting them out once they finished this. The plan was proceeding nicely, but right now he was going to have to rely on the others to keep Zatsune occupied while he set up the finally. The question was, would Naruto be able to pull off his part of the plan. Sasuke moved in the direction of the fight, and knew that he would have to rely on Naruto to choose the timing of the attack.

Len got up shakily. Ryn was slowly getting up beside him, but she seemed to be unstable not just physically, but mentally as well. She was crying. Len had never seen his violent sister cry. It was against her morals to cry.

"Don't worry Ane-chan, I'll take care of it!" gone was the Len in the caves. Gone was the little kid who kept saying 'if only'. Gone was the shy child without any self confidence. His sister needed him to be strong enough for the both of them, so he was. He didn't think twice about it, he just did it.

"noboru noboru kono elevator

karami tsuku miren o furi harai

ue o mezashi nobori tsuzukeru

'naze watashi wa nobotte iru nodesu ka?'

elevator girl iwaku...

'anata no ikizama to taisa wa nai deshō'"

Using waves of chakra, Len created a shell of pure music around himself. He then began to walk towards Zatsune, focusing more on the music than his movement. Zatsune, no longer having to deal with sound blades on top of the fireballs, saw him coming, and sent a Miasma Stream at him. The on looking sound ninjas watched in glee as it hit head on, Len not even trying to dodge.

"So much for that shrimp." Kabuto grinned maliciously. But then they noticed that the Miasma had dissipated, and the Music Armor had not. Finally running out of steam, Zatsune hadn't even had the energy to scratch the determined Genin.

Still singing, Len pushed through the remainder of the stream and kept going, building layer after layer onto his armor with every step. He was unstoppable. Because Ryn needed him to be, because Naruto wasn't there to protect him, because he was the only one left, he **would not** stop.

Len felt as he finally reached the point he had been waiting for. With a massive release of chakra, Len finished the jutsu, turning the Music Armor into a 10 ft tall humanoid suit of sound, with him in the driver's seat.

"This is for Kaito!" Len yelled, pounding one of the oversized fists down on the stunned Zatsune, who just barely blocked it with the katana. "This is for Ane-chan!" Len roared, pounding the other oversized fist down on the still recovering Zatsune, who almost lost her grip on the axe as she used it as a shield. "THIS IS FOR NARUTO!" Len bellowed, Bringing both fists down in an overhead motion, so that the entire weight of the shell came down on Zatsune, who disappeared as the shell itself cracked and fell apart from the force of the blow.

As the dust cleared, the onlookers stood slack jawed at the sheer force of the small Genin's will to fight. Out of the dust, Len stumbled towards Kaito and Ryn, and when he finally got there, he collapsed next to his sister, out cold.

"I did my best, Ane-chan…" Len whispered as unconsciousness took him in its cool void.

**So there you have it, Len is a super hero. Also, I do not own Love Love Nightmare, Meltdown (the song Ryn Sings), or new Millinium (Len's song of determination). And in case you're wondering why I would kill Naruto, BECAUSE OTHERWISE LEN WOULD JUST RELY ON HIS HERO AND NOT MAKE SUCH AN AWESOME SCENE! And besides, I write what feels right, and it felt right. Also, Ane-chan is the equivalent of the English phrase "older sister", so Len is calling Ryn 'Big Sis'.**


	9. Chapter 8

The dust had not finished settling, however. As the last of it cleared away, it became clear that there was another person standing in the cloud. Zatsune smiled at the pile of broken music ninjas in the corner.

"Impressive, I must say." The devilish young woman crooned. "But it'll take a lot more than that to take me out!" Orochimaru, for the first time in his life, lost his composure.

"What in the world IS SHE!" Orochimaru gawked at the bruised but not beaten Chunin. "That shouldn't be possible!" the other sound ninja nodded in agreement, completely forgetting their friend Kimimaru had survived similar treatment once from a particularly drunk, bushy eyebrow-ed Genin.

"Orochimaru, is it?" Zatsune purred, walking over to the five sound ninja. "You look surprised. Surely you did your research on me before you came, right? At least tell me you thought to have a backup plan in case I didn't want to join you?" at this Orochimaru's eyes darkened.

"Yes I have a backup plan! Only an idiot wouldn't!" Orochimaru hissed, "But I would think you would understand the value of a group of allies. After all, they are so hard to find when you are known for enjoying destruction." Orochimaru had regained some of his composure now, but he was still taking a halfstep back for every step Zatsune made towards him.

"Of course. But that doesn't mean one should just join the first group one meets. After all, a girl has to have standards!" Zatsune was almost to them now, and showed no sign of stopping, the three 'Genin' Orochimaru had braught with him nervously stepping between her and their leader. "And my standards for my allies are rather high. So if you want me to join, give me a reason why." Zatsune stopped, now standing a whole half-centimeter in front of the lead guard. Kabuto growled to himself about the offhand way she treated Lord Orochimaru, but didn't step in the way himself. This girl was out of his league.

"Well, my dear. It goes like this: you have incredible strength. I have a huge wealth of funds. I also have an army of slaves to deal with my every whim. On top of this, I have various experimental subjects upon which I try out new jutsu. Because of this last point, I also have a jutsu that releases the dark strength of the corrupted soul, and have verified its safe use, as long as you don't mind the temporary paralysis when you first begin using it and the violent tendencies it induces during use. And it looks to me, you're already violent enough as it is, so the only down side would be the first time you used it you would probably have to wait a little bit while your body adjusted to the new power source. I also have several other experimental jutsus that increase the power of the user I would be willing to share. And all I would ask of you is to follow my lead, and I'd be telling you to do what you love to, already, so there is no real downside that I'm aware of." Orochimaru wasn't so sure about giving her the curse mark, she seemed pretty powerful as it was, but she probably knew about it anyway. Besides, one of those other strengthening jutsus he mentioned had an interesting side effect where the one who was subject to the jutsu became absolutely loyal to the one who performed the jutsu. All he needed was for her to agree to join him, even temporarily, and he would have her forever.

"about those slaves…" Zatsune's smile had become very mischevious, "they would do _anything_ I told them to?" Kabuto had a feeling that she would command them to do some unpleasant things, and was glad Lord Orochimaru had seen his potential and removed him from those ranks so early on.

"Yes. They've been threatened with a fate worse than death should they refuse. And, I must admit, many of them are addicts to drugs that can only be found amongst my people. Highly, highly, addictive drugs." Orochimaru explained, thinking of the looks on the deprived soul's faces when they got even a small taste of the powerful hallucinogen. "so what will it be? Understand that if you decide to refuse, we will have to ensure you can't follow us so you don't know where my little home is. Nothing personal, just the way these things work." Orochimaru smiled, seeing that the addicted and coerced slaves had done what he had expected the offer of power to do.

"This sounds really tempting, Orochimaru" Zatsune leaned foreward, laying an arm on the genin as if he were a bar to lean on. "But I'm afraid I'm not quit convinced. I'm going to need proof that your words are true. Nothing personal, just the way these things work." Zatsune lured, using the same phrase he had to threaten her.

"How about a demonstration? Of the performance improving jutsus? Or perhaps if I provide one of our expendable friends here some of the drugs I told you about?" at this the genin all turned to look at Orochimaru with horror, with the exception of the one Zatsune was leaning on, and he still had a look of horror on his face anyway. Zatsune laughed.

"Oh, look at their cute little faces. I don't think they realized they work for the devil yet." Zatsune laughed again. "Let's see both. First, drug one of them and let me determine just how loyal the addiction makes them, and then use one of the 'strength jutsus' on him, and we'll see just how strong he really is." Orochimaru smiled. These three had already been through the strength booster that made you completely loyal, so they would do whatever he told them anyway, the drug would just make it more obvious.

"Happily." Orochimaru quickly calculated which of the three was the weakest overall, and decided on the one on the left. "Minori, please hold Kaba still while Kabuto and I prepare the dosage." Kaba emediately moved to flee, but the relieved Minori knew that if she didn't catch him, she would be the replacement. On top of that, though she didn't know this part, the jutsu running through her veins told her to obey Orochimaru, and she just came up with an excuse. It wasn't particularly hard, Kaba was more frantic than actually running, and she hald him down on the ground, waiting while Zatsune tried to look over Kabuto's shoulder at the materials they were using while still leaning on the third genin. It wasn't working. The sound ninja had on purpose turned so that she would be unable to see what they were doing.

"There, it's ready Lord Orochimaru." Kabuto handed the syringe to his master, and put his pack of 'medicines' up.

"Please! Lord Orochimaru! I'll do anything! I've always been a loyal servent, please don't make me take that stuff!" Kaba screamed and wriggled as Orochimaru came ever closer, taking his sweet time, enjoying the control. When he finally got there, he crouched down next to the helpless ninja and prepared to administer the drug.

"Now hold still, Kaba. This will only take a minute. Trust me, you'll enjoy yourself." Orochimaru grabbed one of Kaba's arms, and aimed the needle at one of the veins in Kaba's arm. Ever so slowly, Orochimaru brought the needle closer and closer to the exposed vein, smiling viciously as the poor genin struggled helplessly under their grip. Inch by inch, centimeter by centimeter, Orochimaru enjoyed himself at Kaba's expense.

"Chidori!" as the yell echoed throughout the cavern, all the ninjas froze, excluding Zatsune and Orochimaru. The sound of athousand birds began echoing around them, confusing the direction it was coming from, steadily getting louder. Orochimaru sighed and put the syringe aside for the moment.

"Ah, Sasuke. It's good to see you're still training. But did you really have to interrupt me while I did business with Zatsune, here?" Orochimaru turned away from the helpless Kaba and looked in the opposite direction, a little to the right of the still downed music ninjas. "Must this really come to blows?"

Sasuke burst from one of the tunnel walls, creating a whole new hole, and hit the ground running, his Chidori still strong.

"Zatsune!" Sasuke roared, flying across the distance in the blink of an eye, and jabbed at Zatsune from point blank-

-and she caught it. Sasuke stood there for a second, staring at his hand, held in Zatsune's powerful grip. "What. The. Hell." Sasuke breathed. Zatsune, having put the axe in an over-the-shoulder sheath and kept the katana in her hand, was now using her left hand to hold Sasuke's in a vice like grip that was all but breaking the bones in his hand. She smiled at him, and raised her left hand so the katana was level with Sasuke's neck as if she were about to swing it sideways at him. Orochimaru jumped foreword.

"Easy, you witch!" Orochimaru spat, "I need him alive and unharmed!" Zatsune turned and gave Orochimaru a look that said 'care to rephrase that statement?' Truth be told, he did, but he wasn't about to admit it. "There are fates worse than death, as I'm sure you know, and if you harm him I will have to send you to each and every one of those fates!" Zatsune just looked at him like he was some kind of simpleton.

"Fine. I'll kill you first." Zatsune tossed Sasuke across the room, where he landed on Kaito's unconscious body. She then drew her axe, and held herself at the ready. "Nobody tells me what to do. I will never take orders from anyone!" and with that, she jumped foreword, and the fight was on again. Orochimaru quickly threw the syringe off to the side, and began making hand signs, Kabuto and the sound genin jumping to his side, except for Kaba who was lying on the ground weeping for joy of not being drugged.

With a jolt, Kaito sat up, his eyes wide. Sasuke was thrown off of him, and quickly rolled to his feet and looked at the revived Jounin.

"What happened?" Kaito asked as awareness slowly filled his eyes. "Oh, yeah. Zatsune got out and Naruto was killed." Kaito quickly looked over at the Kagamine twins, and sighed when he saw that aside from being exhausted they were fine. Sasuke turned to Kaito with a question in his eyes, but before he could ask it a stray blast of fire from the combatants slammed into the wall above them.

"Come on, we need to back off and get to a safe distance." Sasuke whispered, and silently picked up the unconscious Len. He didn't trust Ryn to stay unconscious if he tried to carry her. Kaito picked her up, however, and the two slowly made their way into the entrance to one of the tunnel entrances where they could watch the fight from safety. Sasuke then turned to Kaito accusingly.

"What is she, and more importantly what happened to Miku Hatsune?" Sasuke drilled the sheepish jounin. Kaito sighed, and leaned back against the wall of the tunnel where he was sitting.

"You might as well sit down. It's a long story, and you'll present less of a target to those five anyway." Sasuke did so, and listened as Kaito ordered his thoughts and slowly worked his way into the memories. "In the land of voices, music is a way of life. It's more than that really, though. It's the way of life. And for the ninjas of the hidden music village, it is life. It is your sword and your shield, your pen and your paper, judge, jury, and executioner. So one day a scientist of the Hidden Music Village asked a question: 'what would happen if there were a ninja for whom music was literally life?' and made it his mission to find out. He researched what kind of people made the best music ninjas, from hair color to gender to personality all the down to tidiness. He decided that the kind of person with the greatest musical potential would be a kind hearted, 5 ft 7 inch tall, thin, teal haired girl with a magnetic personality. So then came the search. Where could he find such a person? And search he did. He searched the entirety of the Land of Voices for such a girl, and he found none." Kaito's eyes looked far away, as if he were living the story instead of telling it. "Not a single person matched this discription. Without proof, the scientist's theory was worthless. He'd already spent huge sums of resourses on this, so if he couldn't prove it, he would be the laughing stock of the scientific world. But what could he do? But he wouldn't give up, and began to try and create a hypothetical situation that would prove his point. But that wasn't working either. Finally, a glimmer of hope came to him. A man came, offering him a jutsu that could be used to alter a dying person into whatever form the scientist chose. Not only would he be able to finally have his perfect singer, but he would be able to save someone's life. The scientist was astounded. When he asked why the man was giving it too him, he explained that he did not have the resourses to be able to use it on people without others nearby, which meant that there would be people who saw what he did and considered him a monster. All he wanted was for the scientist to create for the man a son, and give him to the man after he had finished with his own work. The scientist was too enamored in the idea to think twice. He agreed, and took the scroll with the powerful jutsu written on it, and began applying his now limited resources to acquiring a person who was on the brink of death. And he received several people. At first he experimented with the jutsu's power, and created to nearly identical beings, and called them 'mirrored sound'. Things went exactly as planned, and he was able to create new life from the dying. He was ecstatic." Kaito's eyes gleamed with happy memories. Sasuke could almost see tears in his eyes as Kaito's face changed, and became somber. "But then he decided to create the perfect song ninja, and made his preparations. Then he received a girl who had just been mortally wounded in an attack on the Hidden Music Village, and was not ready to die. She fought against the restraints and as her lifeblood flowed out would not let anyone near her. But because of the restraints the scientist was able to get close enough to perform the jutsu. But even as the girl's life was at an end, she wouldn't except it and fought against death with such ferocity that by force of will she stopped the jutsu. But the jutsu was already being performed, and was impossible to stop. The force, unable to act normally because the girl was not yet dead, was thrown outwards upon the scientist. Even as the force exploded outward, the girl's pulse finally stopped, and the jutsu was able to get in." Kaito's eyes glistened with held back tears as he told the dark story. "The jutsu created the perfect music ninja out of the strong willed girl, but it also altered the scientist. When he awoke, his body had become younger, and his hair had turned blue. More importantly, however, his heart had been changed. He was no longer cold and calculating, but kind and caring. He couldn't believe that anyone could do such a thing to a person, let alone that he had once done it. So I took up a new name to go with his new appearance and devoted myself to protecting the young music ninjas whose lives I had irrevocably altered. But it seems that the jutsu was incomplete on the young girl whose name was once Zatsune, because whenever the new personality Hatsune thinks of something familiar to Zatsune, the dark personality rides the memory to the forefront of her mind, and is released." Kaito tried to rise up onto his feet, but Sasuke put a hand on his shoulder, holding him down. He looked the Jounin in the eyes, looked as far into his soul as his Sharingon was capable. What he found was a repentant old man who ws trying to fix the wrongs of a lifetime.

"Don't worry. We still have one ace up our sleave." Sasuke smiled.

**This chapter takes on a more noir feel than the previous ones, and it took some work to push through the miasma Zatsune through at me, but I think I've got through it now. What's Sasuke's ace? You'll just have to wait to find out. Btw: 2789 words, a new record! This one drags on a little, but I couldn't find anywhere that they were willing to separate into parts. The pieces of this chapter are just to close together, to similar. Back from hiatus (I think that's the word…), I wanted to give my readers a big chapter to make up for it. My only regret is that it had to be the dark part of the story which doesn't match the rest. Please review and tell me if this is too dark, so I can learn and do better in the future. Or review and say it was the perfect amount of darkness, so I can do more in the future.**


	10. Chapter 9

Sasuke smiled as the chaos of the battle between Orochimaru and Zatsune came to a temporary halt. Kaito, right behind him, looked at the Genin, confused.

"What is this ace up our sleave?" Kaito's frown was drilling a hole in the back of Sasuke's neck.

"You'll see." Sasuke looked over at Zatsune, and figured out where she would move in the next little bit. "You'll see in just a little bit." Sasuke slid over the hillock he was watching from and landed behind another one closer to the conflict. Kaito appeared next to him, having slid down behind.

"What could you possibly have left? You had that jab technique that looked particularly powerful, but she caught it like it was nothing!" Kaito hissed at Sasuke, who just kept on smiling.

"I have a plan. Besides, while I have an ace up my sleave personally, it won't be me who uses this ace." Sasuke murmured numbers under his breath as he studied Zatsune's movements as she sent yet another miasma wave at Orochimaru, who again countered it with a wave of snakes. Sasuke began performing hand signs, and then jumped over the hillock and charged.

"Orochimaru!" Sasuke sped across the field, chidori chirping as he swung at the Sanin. Orochimaru just stared at Sasuke for a moment before jumping to get out of the way. Zatsune stopped and stood to the side watching as the other two stood down each other.

"Sasuke! I know your chidori didn't work on the demon girl, but that's no reason to aim it at me. What did I do to deserve this?" Orochimaru looked ready to jump in for the attack regardless, but that wasn't the plan.

"To tell the truth, nothing. The only time you've ever done something that hurt me was when you gave me the curse mark, which was actually giving me power. But right now, I needed the fight to stop for a moment, and if I attacked Zatsune I would have just been tossed aside again." Sasuke smiled. He was telling the truth, so they couldn't figure out anything by using a lie detecting jutsu, not that he believed either of them to be the kind to know such jutsu…

"So you just want us to stand here and talk?" Zatsune laughed, "In case you haven't noticed, that's already failed. The time for talk is gone; it's time for some killing!" Zatsune hefted her oversized axe in Sasuke's direction as if to make the point.

"Well, the only problem with that is that Orochimaru is not going to let you kill me, because he has plans for me, and both Orochimaru and I aren't going to kill you for varying reasons. Orochimaru wants you one of his mindless drones, and I'm not going to kill you for Miku's sake." Zatsune looked at him like he was an idiot. "Miku Hatsune's sake." Sasuke clarified. Zatsune's face went flat at that and then she sneered at him.

"So I'll just kill Orochimaru and then kill you, you snot nosed brat!" Zatsune jumped at Orochimaru, but he had been ready and hit her with another wave of snakes. It was just as effective against the demon girl as all previous attempts, but it did block her vision long enough for Orochimaru to get out of the way.

Sasuke quickly jumped back. This fight was too destructive to be caught in the middle. Kaito, having slipped up behind the closer of the rubble created thus far, signaled Sasuke over to him.

"Did you actually expect that to work?" Kaito hissed at Sasuke as the genin slid behind the rubble.

"Yes, actually. And it did. They moved back towards where the fight originally was." Sasuke leered. Kaito's frown deepened.

"Why do you want them over there? The area doesn't have any rubble to hide behind, and it's so open she can just stand in the center and send out her miasma waves to hold us back!" Kaito seemed ready to bite off Sasuke's head.

"Calm down. There's been a plan for the entire fight. Since we started fighting everything has been going pretty much according to plan." Sasuke tried to empress upon the jounin that there was a reason to the madness. "Suffice it to say that the ace up our sleeve has never been beaten." Kaito just looked more confused than ever, but he held his peace. "Come on." Sasuke lead the way to the edge of the rubble, and along the way picked up the unconscious Kagamine twins, setting them down with them at the edge.

"Their not hurt physically, so I can't heal them." Kaito noted, checking them for harm. "They're just going to have to sleep." Sasuke nodded. They wouldn't need them anyway. Sasuke peaked over the last bit of rubble, looking into the open. The combat had moved in the right direction, but Zatsune hadn't quite made it back to her original spot. Sasuke grinned, thinking of how jelous Shikimaru would be when he heard of this plan.

The waiting seemed to take forever, as Zatsune moved closer and closer to her original position, which was the best place in the room to defend from with her powers. Kaito checked and rechecked the Kagamine twins, making sure they were ok time and time again, until Sasuke finally just told him to quit bothering them before he woke them up. Finally, Zatsune stepped back into her original position, and began throwing miasma waves across the entire chasm, holding Orochimaru back but unable to keep him down either.

"It's time to do this." Sasuke whispered, timing Zatsune again. "We're lucky she uses music so much. She stays on tempo, leaving her moves predictable if you watch her for a while." Sasuke jumped over the last of the rubble and prepared his strike. "Now we end this!"

Sasuke quickly signed and prepared his chidori, and dashed at the demongirl, keeping as low to the ground as possible, in order to avoid her attacks aimed at the primarily airborne Orochimaru. Zatsune saw him coming, and sent a wave of miasma right at him. Sasuke didn't dodge it though, and instead hit it with his chidori; pushing through it until he was almost to her before he ran out of momentum. He wasn't close enough to hit her, but he was close enough for his purposes. In the instant before the miasma overcame his chidori and threw him back, Sasuke reached down and hit the ground with a splayed hand, creating a clapping noise. Sasuke then leaped back, partially propelled by the miasma itself, and landed back near the edge of the fighting. Neither Zatsune nor Orochimaru took notice of his incursion, but Sasuke had finished his part of the plan.

"This is your last chance, Zatsune!" Sasuke yelled above another wave of fire. "Surrender while you still have the chance! You may consider yourself a demon, but I've seen true demons, and you don't stand a chance!" Zatsune laughed.

"Sorry, but I'm not surrendering to anybody!" as Zatsune finished the sentence, a huge blast of energy began pushing through the floor of the huge cave. Red light pulsed out of cracks in the ground, cracks originating from where Sasuke had slapped the ground mere moments before. Kaito stumbled out of the rubble as it was pushed over and knocked down by the miniature earthquake and raw energy bursting forth into the room, carrying the twins on his shoulders.

"What is this!" Kaito yelled, barely audible even though he was only a couple steps from Sasuke.

"Our ace in the hole!" Sasuke yelled back. Orochimaru, upon landing off to the side, looked at Sasuke with recognition.

"It's HIM, isn't it?" Orochimaru cackled. "It IS isn't it? In that case I might as well leave. There won't be any victory for me here, today." And with that Orochimaru leaped across the cave back towards where he had originated from, and joined Kabuto and the other sound ninjas who had been trying to stay out of the way during the fighting.

Zatsune looked around at the red light bursting throughout the cave, the previous blue light completely disappearing as the red energy bust through the floor. Then she seemed to follow the cracks and her eyes grew wide as she realized that their source was pushing up from directly beneath her.

But before she was able to jump out of the way, the floor beneath her exploded, and a giant red ball of chakra burst out of the ground, throwing her to the ceiling, and holding her there. The light from the rest of the cracks died as the source of the light entered the room. Kaito stood there, dumbfounded, as the giant ball of chakra compressed itself into a roughly human sized ball, letting Zatsune fall to the floor, or what was left of it at least, and that's where she layed, slowly getting up.

The ball of chakra, now floating roughly two stories in the air, drifted back down to the ground, and began to deform, pushing more towards a human shape as time progressed. Zatsune stood up, and tried to raise her weapons. But her axe seemed to have been damaged by her impact with the roof, and so she dropped it and just held her katana.

The chakra ball, now a chakra humanoid, was the same size as Sasuke, but had two tails and it's ears were long, pointed, and vaguely fox-like. As they watched, the solid red energy slowly began to become less opaque, allowing them to see that there was a human inside of it. Kaito gaped.

"Is that NARUTO!" Kaito stared as the red figure turned around, and gave a feral snarl. It was Naruto, but the whisker lines on his face had become larger and more rough, and his eyes had turned into red orbs with cat pupils. Sasuke judged that he was almost completely animal at this point.

"Naruto!" Sasuke waved to get the demon child's attention, "Remember Zatsune! She's the one who hurt Ryn!" Sometimes it was helpful to be observant, and Sasuke had noticed the interactions between Ryn and Naruto enough to understand it.

Naruto turned to Zatsune and, unleashing a roar, charged the speachless demoness. Sasuke jumped back into hiding with Kaito, and saw that Ryn was waking up.

"Wazzat racket?" Ryn murmured as she slowly sat up and looked around. "Kaito, Sasuke. What's goi-" Ryn froze as she saw the two tailed Naruto slam into Zatsune, being held back only just barely by her blocking katana. It was obvious the two were on par with each other, and it would not end as it had with their previous attempts to stop Zatsune. "Naruto! What happened to Naruto?" Ryn turned to Sasuke and her eyes lit up like fire "Tell me what you did to NARUTO!" Ryn brought up a fist and held it in Sasuke's face.

"Hold on, Ryn! I'm telling you! I'm telling you!" Sasuke held his hands up in the universal sign of surrender. "so just shut up and listen, ok?" Ryn still looked mad, but she sat back and listened. "About 14 years ago, the nine-tail fox demon attacked the Village Hidden in the Leaves. The fourth Hokage couldn't stop it outright, so he did the only thing he could; he sealed the demon away inside of the child Naruto. Most of the time, it stays behind it's seal, and everything is ok. But sometimes, especially when Naruto is in danger of dying or is really mad, the seal cracks open just a little, and it unleashes the nine-tails' chakra, which Naruto channels. He becomes almost unstoppable, but just as feral as the demon itself. Only his closest and oldest friends are safe when he unleashes the nine-tails, anyone else is just another enemy. Naruto has been training with Jiraiya for the last couple weeks to train it, and they've actually been talking of leaving the village for some isolated training, but I wasn't sure how well Naruto would be able to control it, that's why the plan involves us staying out of sight." Sasuke explained quickly. Kaito and Ryn looked past Sasuke at Naruto and Zatsune grappling each other trying to get an upper hand in the fight.

"Wow. I had no idea." Ryn breathed. "He seemed so carefree; I didn't realize he had such a heavy burden to bear…" Ryn turned to Sasuke, and slugged him in the nose.

"Oof! Whad was dad for?" Sasuke yelled through his hands, which were covering his nose. Ryn glared at him.

"Why didn't you tell me Naruto wasn't really dead!" Ryn grabbed the front of Sasuke's jacket and lifted him to her so she could hit him again.

"Because there wasn't time! Besides, if I told you then Zatsune might have heard, and then what would have been the point?" Sasuke yelled back, flinching as Ryn pulled back her free fist to hit him again. Kaito grabbed her arm, though, and carefully made Ryn let go of Sasuke's jacket.

"Hold it down, you two. We're all on the same side here. It's Zatsune who we need to be fighting." The others looked at him sheepishly, and then sat down turned away from each other.

Meanwhile, Naruto and Zatsune had separated, and were now leaping around the cave. Zatsune would fire one of her miasma waves, and Naruto would hold up an oversized chakra hand to block it, and then extend the hand like a kind of whip and attack with it, and then Zatsune would block it with her katana. The two attacked back and forth again and again, knocking holes in the sides of the cavern and knocking pieces off of the roof, though they were too far underground to create a skylight. Zatsune charged Naruto, running across the wall and then performing a flying slice down on him, only to be caught by his chakra claws. Then he threw her into the wall, and charged after the demoness, who sent a Sound Wave at him, blowing a massive crater in the wall behind him. But Naruto stood his ground, only being slid backwards instead of being sent flying, and took the gap Zatsune took to recover to charge her again.

Zatsune started singing again, this time low, and different. Sasuke didn't recognize this song; it was different. Naruto continued his charge, but Zatsune just sat there singing under her breath as she held the katana to her side in the fasion of a samurai preparing to draw. The blade began to glow a low red, and seemed to grow longer until it was at least twice as long as she was tall. Naruto was almost there, but he still had a little distance to run. Zatsune's voice became louder as she began to give off a powerful red glow in the shape of a single wing on her left shoulder.

Estuans interius

ira vehementi

Estuans interius

ira vehementi

Sephiroth

Sephiroth

Naruto, almost to the demoness, made a flying leap at her-

-And then Zatsune was behind him, katana held out to her right like she had just swung. Naruto landed on his feet, and stood there. The chakra shell suddenly split along the middle and for a second Naruto was in between two clouds of red chakra, and then they swam around him and reformed into the fox-demon shape. Zatsune turned around, and Sasuke saw that she wasn't singing anymore even though he could still hear it in the air, as if there were a chorus somewhere in the cavern singing it.

"You survived? Impressive, but don't think that you can possibly survive me at my full power; that was just a warm-up strike." Zatsune held the enormous katana like it was a normal sword, but Sasuke had no doubt that she wasn't bluffing.

"ZATSUNE!" Naruto's voice was wild and almost animal. He turned around and held one claw out to the side. Swirling red energy began to spiral around in Naruto's hand, forming a red sphere with a smaller blue one in the middle. Zatsune squinted her eyes.

"So you're not all claws and tails, huh?" Zatsune purred, holding the katana so that it passed in front of her just under her eyes. "Very well. As father would say, 'all must return to the planet'."

"What is that Naruto is holding?" Ryn asked, forgetting in the excitement that she was ignoring Sasuke. Sasuke shuddered as he remembered it.

"That's a technique Jiraiya taught Naruto called Resengan. Normally it's a blue sphere the size of his fist, but because he has access to the near limitless power of the nine-tails, it becomes much bigger. I've only ever seen it once like this. I was running away from the leaf village because I thought that Orochimaru could give me the power to beat my brother. Naruto chased me down and eventually he unleashed the nine-tails, and used the Vermillion Resengan on me. I had my chidori, and some advancement powers of my own, but the blast of our collision knocked me out. When I woke up, I was in a leaf village hospital, and Naruto was sitting next to me with his arm in a cast. He'd woken up first and dragged me back. I realized then what a friend he was and how much his friendship meant to me." Sasuke grinned sheepishly at the tale of his own stupidity. "but I guess you weren't interested in the story, were you?" Sasuke turned to Ryn, but she had remembered she was ignoring Sasuke and was busy pretending not to listen.

The two demonic children stood off for another half-second, and then both charged at each other. Zatsune's katana was glowing red again, and Naruto's Vermillion Resengan looked like a red hurricane in his hand. It looked like a battle between a mighty beast of the earth and an angel of death. Right before they collided, Zatsune swung her katana over and around, her attack exaggerated by the size of the overly-long blade.

The two collided in an explosion of red light, the shockwaves creating new cracks in the ground on top of the ones Naruto had already made when he burst out of the ground, and the rubble the others were hiding behind was utterly blown away, knocking them into the air as they were hit. Sasuke grabbed the unconscious Len, and Kaito grabbed Ryn in the split second before the impact hit them, but it was pointless as the sheer force of the wave knocked all four in different directions. Sasuke had just enough time to think "_Show-offs"_ before a flying piece of debris hit him on the head and he blacked out.

**The chapter you've all been waiting for and I leave you hanging again! For those who don't recognize it, the song Zatsune sings is 'One-Winged Angel' from Final Fantasy VII, but it's known just as well as 'Sephiroth's theme'. Thank you one and all for finally believing Naruto was dead just in time for him to return from the grave. Until next time, Machina out.**


	11. Chapter 10

Smoke filled the cavern, along with debris. Sasuke coughed as the dust clogged his throat. Through the dry mist he saw the shadows of Kaito and the Kagamine twins making their way through the rubble toward him. Sasuke turned in the other direction and his sharingon showed him that there was a large amount of chakra being released in what he assumed was the direction Zatsune and Naruto had been in. he wasn't sure of his bearings in the dusty fog.

"Sasuke, is that you?" Kaito called from just beyond easy seeing distance. "Damn, that was a powerful explosion…" Sasuke turned back around to the voice ninjas.

"It's me." Sasuke waved. "How did everyone fare?" they stumbled through the fog until they were mostly visible. Kaito had a cut on his cheek, but it wasn't severe. Ryn was bruised on both elbows and it looked like she had landed on her arms. Len was in general beat up but he was standing and moving like he was fine. For once Sasuke envied the Hyuga clan, because byakugon would be able to tell him how severe their injuries were with precision. Ryn walked up to Sasuke.

"Sasuke?" Ryn asked, her voice oddly lacking emotion.

"Yeah?" Sasuke nervously began scanning her with his eyes, searching for whatever the wound was.

CRACK. Sasuke's head lolled backwards after the powerful uppercut almost knocked him off his feet. Ryn stood there, fist raised, eyes burning.

"Why didn't you TELL US NARUTO WAS STILL ALIVE!" Ryn roared at the stunned Uchiha. Sasuke backed off rapidly as he tried to get his eyes to refocus, failed, and then tried again. This time Ryn came back into focus.

"Sorry! I couldn't risk Zatsune overhearing me! I wanted to tell you, honest!" Sasuke continued backing up as Ryn kept walking towards him. Len grabbed her arm, though, and held her back.

"Ane-chan, he was just trying to help. Now come on, we need to check on Naruto and Miku." Ryn turned like she was going to hit Len, but when she saw the look in his eyes, she seemed to go slack.

"Ok. Let's get going then." Ryn turned and walked past Sasuke authoritatively. Suddenly the rubble next to them began to rumble. As the rubble moved, Ryn jumped back and raised her arms, prepared to attack whatever it was. But as the pieces fell off, Sasuke recognized the figure beneath.

"Jiraiya?" Sasuke had all but forgoten the Sanin was there.

"Sasuke? So we won? What happened? Last thing I remember is Orochimaru walking up and explaining how he wanted this Zatsune under his thumb…" Jiraiya looked around worriedly.

"Long story short none of us could best her, and Orochimaru fleed when Naruto whent nine-tails. We're going now to see how that worked out." Kaito answered. After pushing the remainder of the rubble off of the Toad Sage, the group moved on towards the area with the chakra bursts.

As they got closer, the ninjas saw that with the bursts of chakra, there were also bursts of light. First it would shine blue, then it would shine red, and then blue again. Sasuke had a bad feeling about it, but he kept his mouth shut, and didn't let the others know. He was an Uchiha, and Uchiha aren't scared of anything.

As they got closer, and the dust settled, they heard yelling. It sounded like Miku! But it kept changing. One moment it sounded like Hatsune, and the next sounded like Zatsune. Sasuke didn't hear Naruto at all.

They pushed onward and the yelling got louder and louder until they finally arrived at the source.

"What in the world!"

"Miku!"

"Oh, no!"

"What is that!"

All of them yelled out themselves except Jiriaya, who was unusually serious. In front of them was Miku, and Miku. Miku Hatsune was on their right, and Miku Zatsune was on their left, but ther two were still in the same body. They were each half of the person, and the bursts of chakra and light were the the two's energy meeting in the middle, attacking each other violently.

"Kaito, what's happening?" Sasuke asked the Jounin, "Why is she like that?" Kaito looked worriedly down at the two and then looked at Sasuke.

"The transformation jutsu is unraveling. Naruto's raw power must have disrupted the jutsu's flow! Normally this would mean that Zatsune would return and the jutsu's result, Hatsune, would dissipate into nothing. But Hatsune has existed in her own right for long enough that she can hold her own against Zatsune without the jutsu. The problem is both have a right to exist and the being within them to exist, but they can't both exist at once. Their fighting for the right to be!" the Kagamine twins looked at Kaito like he was an alien.

"What in the world are you talking about? What jutsu?" the twins spoke simultaneously. Kaito looked at them sheepishly.

"The jutsu that sustained Miku's life force. Miku Hatsune isn't the original: Miku Zatsune is. The jutsu I used takes a dying person and creates a new person from that death. Miku Zatsune was found dying from a sword wound, and I used the jutsu to create Miku Hatsune from it. But Miku Zatsune's will to live occasionally overpowered the jutsu, using it to sustain her instead of Hatsune." The kagamine twins' eyes opened wider and wider as he told the story, leaving out the part that they were also the results of the altering jutsu.

"All this time, you said that Miku had a demon sealed inside and that was what happened when the demon took over! You lied to us!" the twins were distraught. Jiraiya seemed to look at Kaito in a new light, and it wasn't one that he liked. "Why didn't you tell us the truth?" the looks on their faces would have been heartbreaking if Sasuke hadn't been worried about Miku.

"I'm sorry. But I didn't want you to think of Miku as less than human, 'cause she's not. And, also…I was ashamed of what I'd done. I didn't want to face my past, so I hid it in lies. I'm so sorry, can you forgive me?" Kaito's eyes watered as he broke down. Ryn looked at Len, who looked from Kaito to Miku, and over to Naruto, who had been laying on the ground snoring the whole time, and then back to Ryn.

"I'm not sure if I can forgive you, not truly. But I understand why you did it, and right now we need to help Miku. Our Miku." Len said, and Ryn nodded, trusting her brother to speak for her. "How can we fix this?" Len asked Kaito.

"I'm not sure, they both exist. From this standpoint we can't do anything. They are in perfect balance." Kaito looked at the two Mikus. "I have no idea what we could possibly do to help. Master Jiraiya, perhaps you have an idea?" Kaito looked at the Sanin hopefully. Jiraiya gave Kaito a disappointed look, then sighed.

"I have an idea, but I don't think we have the people here required to pull it off. I need a medical ninja, a source of near limitless chakra, and an expert in illusion jutsu." Jiraiya shook his head sideways. "And even with Naruto here for the limitless chakra, that's only the smallest part of it." Kaito's eyes seemed to have regained the gleam they had possessed when he had first arrived at the Hidden Leaf Village.

"I'm a fare medical ninja, though by no means great. And sound style jutsu is a variation of illusion, though not truly genjutsu, so between the three of us you probably have an expert, wouldn't you say?" Kaito pointed out triumphantly. "What do you have in mind?" Sasuke listened out of the corner of his ear as he studied the Mikus with his Sharingon. Kaito was right; the two were perfectly balanced, and violently opposed to each other. If only they could tip the scale, even a fraction, it would be enough.

Ryn walked over and began shaking Naruto lightly, trying to wake him up, while Jiraiya drew a summoning circle on the ground around the Mikus while Len drew an identical one next to the first. Kaito joined Sasuke in examining their friend/foe, and as he did so turned to Sasuke.

"What do you think? This sounds like a bunch of smoke and mirrors to me, and I fight using sound!" Sasuke smiled, then turned to look at Kaito.

"It does, doesn't it? But I met a ninja once, she was one of Orochimaru's top four ninjas. She used her flute to create genjutsu illusions. She even went to the point of summoning using only her flute. If one ninja can do that, then six ninja can pull off this." Sasuke suspected that Jiraiya was leaving something out, but he couldn't figure out what. According to Jiraiya, they were going to create a fake body using illusion jutsu and then transfer Zatsune's consciousness into it. It was obvious that part of it was fake, but what would really happen when they tried to convey the consciousness of Zatsune into an illusory body? A fake body couldn't hold a real being, so what would happen to her? Not that Sasuke particularly cared; the demoness deserved to die for what she had done to him and his friends today.

"Ok, Jiraiya, I think I've got the mental energy figured out. They've split the brain right down the middle, with the left side controlling the right side of the body and vice versa." Kaito explained to Jiraiya, who by now was right next to him from drawing the circle. Jiraiya nodded and stood up.

"Done over there, Len?" Jiraiya asked across Miku. Len looked up and nodded, then stepped over to the others by walking around the circle. Ryn and Naruto walked over, but Naruto's face was one big question.

"So…you need me to let the nine-tails out so you can use it as a battery?" Naruto asked pointedly. "You realize that I literally see red when that happens, right? Someone's going to have to hold me down, and they can expect to get beat to crap." Kaito looked over at Miku nervously.

"None of us could even hold our own against Zatsune, and you not only beat her, but disrupted the sealing jutsu on her. Now we have to hold you down? I think I found a flaw in your plan, Jiraiya." Kaito looked at Jiraiya with a worried look on his face. "What now?" Jiraiya just turned to Sasuke.

"Normally, I would reject this idea before it even became one, but these are extenuating circumstances. Can you hold him back if you use the curse mark?" Jiraiya asked. Sasuke frowned as he thought about it. He was fairly level with Naruto, but when the two had fought at the waterfalls when he had run for Orochimaru, Naruto had been the victor.

"I don't know." Sasuke admitted. "I have the best chance of any of us, but I'll be trying to hold him still, and he'll be trying to kill me. He won't have to hold back. But I can try." Sasuke watched the idea bounce around in Jiraiya's head for a few seconds while the others looked at him in confusion.

"Ok. If you're willing to try, then let's do it. It's our only chance anyway." Jiraiya answered. "Go for it. Sasuke first, then when he has you, then you release the nine-tails Naruto." Sasuke closed his eyes and focused his chakra on the small black mark on the side of his neck where Orchimaru had bitten him all those months ago. Immediately he felt a response. At first the spot just heated up, but then it began to grow. Slowly he felt the heat spread across his face. It spread down his back, then across his shoulders and down his legs and arms. Soon his whole body was covered in the heat from the curse mark. He heard the voice ninjas gasp as the curse mark spread, but he wasn't done yet. If Naruto was going to release enough of the nine-tails to provide them with chakra, he was going to have to go all the way to second stage. He moved his focus to the bridge of his nose, where the curse mark was hottest, and pushed chakra into that point with all his strength. Instantly he felt the power surge through him as the curse mark continued to the second stage. He felt a pushing on his back, and stretched his shoulders so that his skin and jacket were as tight as possible on his back. After a few seconds of building pressure, he heard a ripping sound and felt the wings push out of his back and spread wide. He was fully second stage curse mark now. Sasuke opened his eyes and turned to Naruto, on purpose avoiding the looks from the voice ninjas.

"Naruto, get started." Sasuke barked, the curse mark was already burning. At the second stage it was more stable and less likely to disable him, it burned like hell, and he needed this to be over as soon as possible. Naruto abliged and soon Sasuke could see the red chakra of the nine-tails flowing forth. Before he could lose control, Sasuke grabbed onto Naruto and focused all his jutsu created strength on holding Naruto still. He was just in time, as Naruto started growling and violently thrashing in his grip. "If you're going to do something, do it quick!" Sasuke grunted at the staring ninja.

Jiraiya burst into motion, grabbing the others and starting the 'summoning' jutsu that would create the illusory body for them to move Zatsune into. Jiraiya put his hand on Naruto's head and the other on Kaito's. Kaito in turn put his left hand on Miku's head and the other on the center of the summoning circle. The kagamine twins kneeled across from each other on either side of the summoning circle and started singing in low tones, performing the ritual. Because of his Sharingon, Sasuke was able to watch as the nine-tails' chakra travelled along Jiraiya's arm, down through his stomache, up across the other arm, and into Kaito, and from there it travelled down into the empty summoning circle. From there he saw the Kagamine twins manipulate the chakra into the shape of a human body. It was, in fact, a perfect copy of the one next to it in the other circle, aside from the fact that it lacked any substance whatsoever. Naruto was becoming more violent now that Jiraiya was pulling chakra, but Sasuke somehow managed to hold Naruto in place, but he wasn't sure how much longer he could do it.

Meanwhile, Kaito had started singing now, and Sasuke could see the nine-tails chakra flowing down both his arms into both Miku and the fake body. Slowly, the Zatsune side of the body seemed to recede and Sasuke could see as the chakra moved little by little across Kaito and into the fake body. It was working!

Suddenly, Naruto's hand landed on Sasuke's side, and as he felt his body beginning to spin Sasuke realized that Naruto had just hit him with a resengan. Sasuke tried to hold on but it was too late. A blink after Naruto had hit him; Sasuke was flying across the cave and into a wall. Immediately Naruto yanked Jiraiya's hand off of him and Sasuke from his aerial vantage point could see as the chakra powering the dual jutsus failed and Zatsune's energy returned to Miku. Sasuke reacted as fast as he could, swooping down on Naruto, a Black Chidori already charged and extended in front of him. Naruto didn't even have time to turn around as Sasuke hit Naruto on the part of the spine that knocks you unconscious. But Sasuke was using Chidori, and the impact was strong enough to send Naruto flying across the cave himself, where he slammed into the wall and the nine-tails chakra disapated.

"I can't hold it!" Kaito yelled as the last of Zatsune reentered Miku, and the fake body fell apart into wisps of chakra.

"It's too late, Zatsune's energy has tied itself into the body!" Sasuke said as Jiraiya moved to get Naruto. "I think she realized what we were doing; she won't fall for that trick again." Sasuke looked for something else they could do. The two Mikus were in perfect balance again. Perfect balance, where even the smallest of push in either direction would determine the victor…Sasuke face-palmed himself.

"What?" Kaito asked, noting Sasuke's actions. "What did you figure out?" Sasuke looked Kaito in the eyes.

"The transformational jutsu." As Kaito blanched, Sasuke forged on. "We can't separate them, but they're in perfect balance. All it will take is a little chakra focused at making Miku Hatsune dominate and she will be. Then she can overcome Zatsune and at least things will be returned to how they were before, perhaps even better if Miku is the stronger of the two." Kaito's eyes looked haunted as he answered.

"I swore to never use that accursed jutsu again. I know you mean well, but power like that is corrupting. I-"

"You have a chance to set things right, Kaito." Jiraiya interrupted. "You have a chance to fix this mess you've made. So fix it." Kaito blanched even more, then nodded.

"You're right. All this and I'm still running. Time to face my past and fix the future." Kaito stood up and moved so he was standing at Miku's head, then frowned. "There's just one problem; the jutsu had to be done by two people simultaneously. And it is way too long and complex for me to teach it before Miku's body fails from the constant battle of the two girls' souls." Kaito drooped.

"Then let me help." Sasuke stepped up to the remains of the circle so that he was at Miku's feet. "With my Sharingan, I can mimic you as you perform the jutsu. For all intents and purposes, I will be performing it simultaneously with you." Kaito's back straitened at that, and he even managed a smile.

"Then let's fix this!" and raised his hands and prepared to perform the jutsu. Sasuke mimicked Kaito's stance and prepared himself for the jutsu.

Kaito started slowly at first, as though he hadn't believed that Sasuke could actually mimic him as he did it, but when Sasuke stayed with him he sped up a little. Sasuke recognized this part of the jutsu, and out of the corner of his eye he saw the summoning circle change as he had expected. Kaito was still moving a little slowly, but Sasuke was keeping up without a sweat, so Kaito sped it up again. Zatsune seemed to realize what they were doing, and Sasuke felt a counter jutsu start up. Kaito, also feeling it, sped up again. Now they were really moving. The onlookers could only make out blurs where the two's hands should have been, even Jiraiya. Sasuke could feel Zatsune's countering, and was worried that she would overpower them, when it became disrupted. Kaito frowned as he continued performing the jutsu. Sasuke shook his head side to side to attract the jounin's attention, then mouth one word: _Hatsune. _Kaito's eyes widened, and he truly smiled then, and they continued the jutsu, Sasuke could feel the building power coming to a climax, and braced himself mentally for the release.

"NOOOOOOOOOooooooo…" Miku screamed using Zatsune's voice. Sasuke smiled as Kaito and he placed the final handsign, and released the jutsu.

The burst of raw chakra from the jutsu knocked Jiraiya and the Kagamine twins away in a blast of light. Kaito and Sasuke were held in place by the jutsu itself, but even so Sasuke only just barely held on as the energy pushed him back several paces. then it was gone, and the cave went dark. For the first time since Zatsune had been unleashed, the only source of light in the cavern was the glowing mosses, most of which had been destroyed by the combat. It was so dark Sasuke could only just barely see. after a couple of seconds his eyes ajusted though, and he could see that Kaito had also been pushed back and was now just outside of a crater that had been made during the battle. about halfway between him and Sasuke was Miku.

Sasuke dashed foreward and quickly covered the distance to the unconseous chonin.

"Miku?" Sasuke could tell that it looked like his Miku, but that didn't prove anything. "Miku, are you here? Come on, wake up!" Miku made a faint groaning sound and turned her head foreward. Slowly her eyes opened.

"Sasuke? Is that you?" Miku frowned. Sasuke realised he was still in curse mark form, and let the energy recede.

"Yeah, it's me. Sorry about that. Are you ok?" Miku seemed much more at ease and half smiled. Sasuke kept his sharingan up, and checked and double checked for any sign of Zatsune or injury.

"I'm fine, though really tired. My memory's fuzzy, but i do remember what happened after Naruto disrupted the transformation jutsu. Thank you for helping me." Miku smile all the way this time and tried to lift herself up, but only managed to sit up before having to give up.

"Here, let me help you." Sasuke slipped his arm under hers and lifted her up. by now the others were arriving. "Come on," He called out to the group, "Let's go home." and then he thought about that statement. "Or rather back to the Hidden Leaf Village." Sasuke tried his best, but he just couldn't keep himself from smiling.

**Now THIS is the longest chapter to date. And ever as far as this story is concerned. The story is coming to a close…but we're not done yet! See you next time for the finally, my loyal fans!**


	12. Epilogue

Sasuke dropped out of the tunnel and into the light. The sun was bright and for a moment he couldn't see, but then his eyes adjusted. Around him were all the Hidden Leaf Ninjas that had been there when they left, even Iruka Sensei, who looked equal parts irritated and releaved. But there was some new people there as well; Kakashi was there, along with Tsunade and Shizune.

"Sasuke, I have several questions for you, but first where are the others?" Tsunade seemed to be only barely containing her rage.

"Right behind me." Sasuke answered, and sure enough he felt the brush of wind that meant someone else had come out of the 3rd Hokage's nose. Sasuke stepped forward to make room for them and the others behind. He didn't have to turn around to know that the one behind him was Miku. He could just feel it.

After a few seconds the entire group had come out of the caves and were standing in the noonday light. Tsunade stepped up to Sasuke and pointedly looked around.

"And where, pray tell, is Neji? And while you're answering questions, WHAT THE HELL WERE YOU THINKING TAKING THE IMPORTANT AMBASADORS INTO AN UNKNOWN SITUATION WITHOUT SO MUCH AS A THOUGHT FOR THEIR SAFETY!" Tsunade roared, pushing Sasuke back as though she was using voice jutsu herself.

"Neji is looking for ice-cream, which he was doing, at our guests request, before we even became aware of the water problem. And as for taking the visitors into the caves, Naruto is the foremost expert on the inside of the caves, and as it turns out there was no problem: the water was Jiraiya." Sasuke pointed, knowing full well that when he wrote the report for the mission he would have to provide the truth. But it helped to imply that all the fault was Jiraiyas.

"Jiraiya?" Tsunade gave the sanin in question a death glare. "What were you doing?" Jiraiya sighed and pointedly looked around at the onlookers.

"That can't be discussed out in the open, Tsunade. I'll tell you what happened, but first let's get away from prying eyes." Tsunade seemed to become aware of her surroundings for the first time. She nodded, and the two, along with Shizune, leaped off for the Hokage's mansion. Kakashi stepped foreward, looking at Kaito.

"Lady Tsunade had wanted me to take over the guide duty for these two and Neji, but it looks like they are doing a better job than she thought." Sasuke could have swore that kakashi winked, but because of his headband it looked like he blinked. "So I'm just going to go back home for the day. Have fun." And with that Kakashi left. Sasuke turned to Miku and the others.

"So where do you want to go next?" Naruto jumped at that, and regretfully stepped away from Ryn. "There are some terrific places to get a quick meal nearby, and then we can continue the tour." Naruto grinned and took the lead.

"I know a terrific place, though it's a little far from here. It's called Ichiraku Ramen…" Naruto began to explain how wonderful the ramen shop was as Ryn Avidly listened. As the others fell behind him, Sasuke turned to Miku.

"I'm not a big ramen fan, but not a kunai's throw from there, there is a dumpling shop that is all the rage right now. Care to try it?" Miku's eyes lit up.

"I love dumplings. Sounds terrific." Sasuke didn't know when it had got there, but at some point Miku's hand had found its way to his, or maybe it was the other way around. But he didn't care. As they traveled, Miku sang.

**Sora miageta yoru**

**Nagareru kumo**

**Te wo nobashi te hoshi wo nazoru**

**Todoka nakute miokuru kedo**

**Hoshi wa mawatte ku…**

Sasuke didn't even try to stop the smile this time…

** And there we go! The song Miku sings in this chapter is Stargazer. I do not own it, so please don't sue me. Thank you to all my loyal readers, it's been a great trip, but now it's time for the master of time and space Bio ex Machina to travel on to the next-**

"DID YOU FORGET ABOUT ME!" The group stopped and looked to their left and saw Neji. He was dirty, scuffed up, beat up, his clothes were all but rags, his headband was missing, and he was swaying back and forth like he might fall over any minute. In his hand was a waffle cone of vanilla ice-cream.

"Ice Cream!" Kaito dashed over, shoving Neji down in the process, and just stood there licking the dairy product like a maniac. Neji stayed down, having passed out from exhaustion. Naruto and Len picked up the unconscious Hyuga and carried him across their shoulders.

"What this guy needs is some life-giving nourishment!" Naruto crowed, "Let's go get some Curry of Life from Lee!" The now complete group continued on their way, and aside from the stomach ache of a life time in the near future, everybody was happy as a sense of peace fell over the Village Hidden in the Leaves…


End file.
